


Something Like Trust

by tallerthanaffliction



Category: The Folk of the Air - Holly Black
Genre: Aftercare, Angst, BDSM, Begging, Blindfolds, Bondage, Breathplay, Butt Plugs, Caning, Cardan learns to use a remote control, Collars, Discipline, Dom/sub, Exhibitionism, F/M, Face Slapping, Flogging, Handcuffs, Ice Play, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Implied/Referenced Sexual Assault, Marking, Nipple Clamps, Orgasm Delay/Denial, Punishment, Riding Crops, Slapping, Spanking, Subdrop, Subspace, Teasing, Vibrators, Wax Play, bdsm contracts, don't read this if you're not FUCKING READY, post-TWK
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-07-17
Updated: 2020-06-25
Packaged: 2020-06-30 08:29:49
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 36,349
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19849396
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tallerthanaffliction/pseuds/tallerthanaffliction
Summary: “I was thinking of an arrangement which would allow you moments of powerlessness. An arrangement in which I would take the control, allowing you to experience the feeling of an utter lack of responsibility, a feeling in which I am in command of all and you have no worries to speak of.”





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Spoilers for TWK!

Everyone who knew Jude Duarte came quickly to realize that what she sought, above all else, was power. Control. Influence. That she had long felt powerless, and that she remedied this through a combination of scheming and working to rise to the top.

And rise to the top Jude had.

There were few higher places for an 18-year-old mortal girl to be than by the side of the High King of Elfhame, ruling a kingdom with him. And there were few people more profitable to be close to than the High King himself.

There were times, though, when Jude — though she would never admit it — craved above all else a respite from the power. The control. The influence. Craved, in fact, a moment of return to that place of powerlessness, when the worries of the kingdom had been anyone’s but hers and she was free to rest and roam rather than reign.

And there were moments, now, after nearing 6 months since Jude’s return to Elfhame and eventual semi-reconciliation with Cardan, when Jude imagined herself as powerless once more and still imagined Cardan by her side, not ruling together, but simply _being_ together.

When these thoughts struck Jude she would roughly and with decisiveness shove them to the back of her mind and pretend she had never experienced them. Jude could no more afford a break from her power than she could afford to become emotionally involved with her fellow ruler. These were thoughts she had no choice but to keep to herself, as she did most of her thoughts and all of her feelings.

Until tonight, when Jude was drunk.

Jude was, to be quite transparent, far past drunk. Jude was heavily intoxicated, and, she reasoned, through no fault of her own. She had overheard several subjects of Elfhame debating how, exactly, they were expected to take seriously a queen who was not only mortal, but didn’t even _drink_. The King, of course, drank his fill — why was the queen so serious all the time? How could she ever expect to fit in with faeries if she wouldn’t even let loose at a revel?

Jude, of course, wanted nothing more than power, and power was a child, born of respect and fear. She rationalized, then, that to fit in in Elfhame more fully would be to earn respect, and with respect, power. She gained from this the idea that she had no choice but to drink.

And drink she did.

Cardan looked on from his throne in bewilderment and something akin to amusement as Jude danced and drank with the people of Elfhame. He wanted nothing more than to join her in her drunken fun, but felt that this was something, strange as it was, she needed to do on her own.

When Cardan was falling asleep on the throne and the sun was beginning to make the day known, Jude finally approached the dais, stumbling and smiling and so, so stunning — at least, that was all Cardan could think of as she draped herself over her throne, positioned beside his.

“Cardan, I danced,” she said. Cardan made a most concerted effort to school his face into seriousness, or at least not to laugh at her. He didn’t want to ruin this.

“Yes, Jude. I watched,” he said in a low voice.

To Cardan’s surprise, he saw a faint blush spread over Jude’s cheeks.

“Did you?” she said, and pushed herself with some difficulty closer to him. “Would you like to watch me further? Perhaps in my chambers, and perhaps wearing less than we are now?” Jude whispered the words, but Cardan was still taken aback. It was rare — unheard of, really — of Jude to be so forward, or forward at all.

Cardan and Jude were no strangers to sleeping together, but Cardan usually initiated it, delivering smirks and pointed remarks until Jude rolled her eyes and almost admitted to having desire of her own. Now, though, Jude was too drunk to care that her want could be used against her as a weakness.

As strongly, though, as Jude’s words and posture affected Cardan, he was loathe to do anything with Jude that she would regret in the morning, or that he would regret as taking advantage of the woman he had begun to admit to himself that he had feelings for.

“I think, my dear Jude, that you have had too much to drink for me to consider your admittedly delightful proposal.”

Jude merely smiled and closed her eyes, swaying slightly. “I love it when you call me dear,” she said softly.

Cardan felt a pressure on his chest, the sensation that his ribs might break and puncture his heart and end his immortal life right here and now.

“And I love that you’ve told me that, but I think I should return you to your chambers before you say anything else you will hate yourself for in the morning.” The words were sad, and so was Cardan as he considered what Jude would likely do to herself for even that small admission.

Jude and Cardan didn’t share chambers, and certainly not for Cardan’s lack of trying. Jude refused to become closer with Cardan than sex and a rare moment of shared silence afterward, than discussing the workings of the kingdom. Cardan had asked — near begged, really — Jude to move in, but she had steadfastly refused to assent.

“ _Your_ chambers, today, I think,” said Jude, her voice low. Cardan felt his blood heating despite himself, but pushed the thoughts away — now was not the time to lose himself in his passion for her.

“My chambers, then, but to sleep.”

Jude positively pouted. “You’re no fun. Why are you no fun? I’m supposed to be the no fun one.”

Cardan smiled at that. “Yes, those are our usual roles, aren’t they? But tonight, you’ve had a little too much fun, so I am saddled with the role of the serious.”

Jude continued to pout. “Are you gonna take care of me?” she asked, brightening slightly at the thought.

“For the night,” Cardan said quietly, before standing and offering Jude his hand. “On any other, you would run me through for the barest implication that you needed caring for.”

Jude laughed. “I wouldn’t run you through. You’re Cardan!”

“So I am,” he replied.

“I wouldn’t run Cardan through. I’d miss him.”

Realizing that Jude seemed to have forgotten with whom she was speaking, Cardan led her in silence to his chambers, still mulling over her words. It was nice, at the basest level, to hear that she had no desire to kill him. Even that small mercy took him by surprise. “ _My ruthless girl_ ,” he thought, and then corrected himself. She was not his girl, after all.

When they arrived in his chambers, Cardan helped Jude into bed before lying down beside her. He may have been unwilling to engage in anything sexual while she was in her present state, but he had no qualms about taking advantage of it to be close to her. The morality of his behavior had improved over the past months ruling with Jude, but he adopted no pretense of being perfect.

To his shocked delight, Jude snuggled close to him, tucking her head against his chest when he rolled toward her. He tentatively placed an arm over her side, and she hummed happily. Jude and Cardan had shared time, shared kisses, shared rule of a kingdom, but they had not shared true intimacy since the night they were married. Until, that is, this moment, a moment Cardan placed quietly into his heart to cherish in the days, weeks, months of cold that were sure to follow this night.

He thought this was the end of the happy moments, that Jude would drift off to sleep and that he would face an angry, hungover mortal the next day, but instead, Jude spoke.

“I know I’ll be too afraid to say this tomorrow,” she whispered. “I’m not so drunk as to forget my own nature.”

“Maybe you shouldn’t—“

“I’m cruel to you anyway, Cardan, wouldn’t you rather hear what I have to say now and face my wrath tomorrow?”

Cardan remained silent.

“Sometimes I don’t want this power,” Jude spoke, slowly, softly. “Sometimes I want to feel powerless again, to feel like the weight of a kingdom doesn’t rest on our shared shoulders. Like we’re kids again, like you’re treating me badly during lessons on warm evenings in the gardens. Or like we’re older, and you’re kinder, and we have time to be away from all of this. Can you imagine if we had the space and time to be powerless, even for a second?”

Jude sighed. “I know it makes no sense,” she said, “I know you think that everything I am seeks power, but there’s something else there, inside me. Don’t forget that there’s something else, ok?”

Her words grew more desperate, and with the desperation, more slurred, as she continued speaking. But Cardan barely noticed her fading — an idea had come to his mind, one he could not release despite its insanity, despite the fact that all would be lost when they woke.

“It makes perfect sense, Jude,” he spoke as she drifted off to sleep. “And I know exactly what you need.”

—

“What is it?” These were the first words Cardan heard upon waking. He had slept until nightfall, they both had, and he could see the rays of the setting sun outside the window, the pink and purple hues of the night-turning sky. For a moment, he didn’t even process the question.

“What?” he asked sleepily, beginning to sit up only to find a hand on his chest pinning him to the bed.

“I asked you what it is,” Jude said, voice nothing more than mildly annoyed despite the harshness of her actions. “What is it that I need?”

“You remember that?”

Jude rolled her eyes. “I may have been mildly intoxicated, but I still remember the morning, Cardan.”

Cardan smiled at what she termed “mild” intoxication. “Do you truly want to know?”

“Yes.” Her voice was solemn now, almost nervous, as if she could sense that his answer would not be an easy one.

It wouldn’t.

Cardan’s smile turned to a smirk as he looked up at her, hair and clothes rumpled from sleep, eyes wide with anticipation. She was beautiful, and he was glad to be telling her this, despite how she would surely react.

“I was thinking, my Jude, of an arrangement of sorts.”

“What kind of—“

“Let me finish, Jude.”

She was quiet.

“I was thinking of an arrangement which would allow you moments of powerlessness. An arrangement in which I would take the control, allowing you to experience the feeling of an utter lack of responsibility, a feeling in which I am in command of all and you have no worries to speak of.”

“You would take charge of the kingdom?”

“I would take charge of _you_ , Jude.”

There was silence for several moments, utter, complete silence as Jude studied him. He expected at any second for her to yell, hurt him, get up and leave, or in some other way snap. It would be worth it. But, to his surprise, she merely said,

“Explain.”

And explain he did.

“I would take charge of you — specifically of your body, and specifically sexually, but your mind would follow, I expect. My every command you would follow, or risk punishment. This could be situational or constant, depending on your level of comfort. That means that we could either have assigned stretches under which these conditions are met — you obey me, I care for you, and the focus is on the sexual — and the rest of the time we would be the same Jude and Cardan we are now, bickering and never once obeying the other, unless forced to do so” (this he said with a pointed look, reminding Jude of their past arrangement).  
“Alternatively, we could have a constant arrangement, one in which you always obey my commands or you are punished. In this way, you could both have power and powerlessness simultaneously, depending on the situation. Both of these, I assume, sound far outside your comfort, but Jude, I implore you to at least consider what I suggest, even if you do no more. Consider what it would mean for you.”  
With this last desperate plea, Cardan fell silent, awaiting the stormy anger he expected from Jude. This time, his expectations were met.

“Do you think,” she said in the deadly calm he had learned to fear in their time together, “that I trust you, Cardan?”

“No, but I think that you need to.”

“For this? For your deranged sex idea?”

“For this, for our ruling together, for our marriage, for your health.”

“Our marriage has been a sham since you exiled me,” she spat, bringing up wounds Cardan had never been so bold as to think healed.

“I should like it not to be.”

There was a moment of silence before Jude spoke once more.

“What kind of punishments?”

Cardan felt acutely the whiplash of this conversation.

“Some physical, some lack of privileges, depending on the intensity of the relationship. Some pleasant and playful and some less so.”

“Would you ever hit me?”

“Only with your explicit permission and desire.”

“Hit me. I desire it.”

Concentrating on the effort not to let his shock and his own desire show on his face, Cardan brought a hand up from where it had rested on the bed, reached to where Jude still hovered over him, and slapped her thigh, hard. She still wore her dress from the revel of the night before, allowing his hand to connect with bare skin.

Jude gasped in surprise, then rolled onto her back beside him.

“And what if I did obey?” was her next question, asked tentatively.

“I would reward you.”

“What kind of rewards?”

“Would you like me to demonstrate those, as well?”

Jude’s silence served as assent, and Cardan rolled onto his elbow to hover over Jude’s frame.

“I might start like this,” he said, trailing his hand across the high neckline of Jude’s dress, over her throat.

“And move lower,” he added, running his hand over her chest to cup her breast gently. “Like this.”

Jude bit her lip, rubbed her missing fingertip against her thumb, the tell-tale sign of her nervousness. Cardan continued.

“I might tease you a bit, even when you had been good, because the important aspect of this is that you are subject to _my_ desires. No matter how good you’ve been, if I want to punish you, I may, and if I want to reward you, I will do so at my leisure.” As he spoke, he grazed his fingertips over her breast, studiously avoiding her nipple. She wasn’t wearing a bra — she must have removed it in her drunken sleep, and he could see the peak of her nipple under the thin fabric of her dress.

When, after several long minutes, he finally brushed her nipple with his knuckle, Jude breathed a sigh of pleasure.

“Here,” Cardan said, pausing his ministrations, “I might give you an order. I might tell you to be quiet, or not to move, or both, and if you break the rules...” he slapped her thigh hard once again. “You might find you rather dislike the results.”

Cardan could see the effect he was having on Jude and pushed forward, wanting nothing more than to convince her that this was what she needed. He had never expected to get this far on a subject he expected her to shut down immediately, and he would not sacrifice the opportunity.

“Next, I might move lower...” he slid his hand down over her stomach, felt the softness there that covered hard muscle.

“Down to here, perhaps,” he said as he reached the junction of her thighs. “And since this is a reward, I would likely not make you wait too terribly long for what you would so desperately, desperately want.”

As Cardan’s hand slipped under Jude’s dress, he felt the wetness between her thighs and knew his words and actions had their desired effect.

“I see that this is already what you desperately, desperately want, my dear Jude?”

Jude’s hand darted out and clasped Cardan’s wrist, pulling it out from under her dress. He could never hope to be stronger than her, so he waited in anticipation for what she would say.

“Yes,” she said breathlessly, and Cardan relaxed slightly. “Alright, Cardan. Let’s try. You have tonight to convince me that this is anything other than a horrible idea.” Here she paused, and he saw a shadow come over her face, knew that whatever she was about to say was hard for her.

“I don’t trust you, Cardan, and maybe I never will—“

“Jude—“

“ _But_ ,” she said emphatically, “I’m willing to try. To see how it goes. And besides, I suppose that I trust you more than most people in my life, okay? That’s something.”

Cardan felt the familiar chest-crushing feeling as he gazed at her in the wake of that admission, one that would have been small had she been anyone but Jude Duarte.

“Does my time start now?” was all he replied, not wanting to get emotional and ruin this moment.

“I suppose,” she said, feigning a lack of care when Cardan could tell she was still flustered from his actions.

Cardan leaned in and pressed a gentle kiss to Jude’s lips. To his continual surprise, she didn’t pull away- instead, she reciprocated, deepening the kiss slightly. This, if nothing else, revealed how aroused she was, and Cardan couldn’t help but smile at her willingness and desperation.

When he finally pulled away, it was because Cardan had business to attend to before they could truly begin the day that might change everything.

“There are a few things we need to discuss, and they happen to be the type of things that are best gone over with paper and pen.” He moved to retrieve both of those items, and to his delight Jude remained still on the bed, awaiting his return. Perhaps, he mused, she would be more obedient during this whole endeavor than he ever expected.

When he returned, Cardan sat cross-legged on the bed as Jude drew a knee up on which to rest her chin.

“The first item we need to discuss is your limits. These are the things I am absolutely, under no circumstances, allowed to do to you or to order you to do. These can be sexual or not, and this list can be edited at any time as you think of more.”

“I don’t...” and here Jude paused, taking a moment to overcome embarrassment over what she was about to say. “I don’t think I know enough about the things we might be doing to know what my limits would be.”

“And that is utterly acceptable,” Cardan said, rushing to reassure her. “They can be anything. For example,” and with this, he ran a hand down the side of her arm, leaving goosebumps in its wake, “you’ve made it abundantly clear that you have no qualms about being slapped. If you did, we would add it to the list. But if it helps you, I can list some things I may do and you can enlighten me as to how you would respond to them.”

Jude nodded, and Cardan steeled himself against his arousal, driven higher by the prospect of listing potential acts, to focus on the task at hand.

“How would you feel,” Cardan asked, “if I made you wait to orgasm for, say, 2 hours as I teased you?”

Cardan could see, feel the change in Jude’s posture as she became more aroused.

“I’m sure I would not feel good about that in the moment,” she replied, eyebrows raised, “but hearing about it, it sounds... appealing.”

“And if I made you wait for a day?”

Jude snorted. “As if you have the time as High King to take an entire day to tease me.”

“Nothing would be stopping me from ordering you to tease yourself when I was otherwise occupied.”

Jude flushed now. Cardan had been trying, to little avail, to help Jude become more comfortable talking about sex. They were doing it, after all, but outside of the act itself when Cardan brought it up Jude often became irate or uncomfortable.

Maybe, Cardan mused, some part of that was to do with the fact that he, as frequently as possible, brought it up loudly and in public.

Still. This conversation was a significant step towards growing Jude’s comfort in the topic, and Cardan planned to milk the opportunity for all he could.

“And if I didn’t have the time?” Jude asked at length, returning to the conversation.

“You might be surprised,” Cardan said, lowering his voice and leaning closer to Jude’s ear, “how easily you can slip out of a meeting and into a closet when the threat of my hand on your beautiful ass looms over you.”

Jude tried to jerk away from Cardan, but he held her chin tightly and pulled her back.

“You forget, I think, that we have already begun. You will not pull away from me, do you understand?”

Jude flushed hotter and grumbled something that resembled, “okay.”

“That was your first and only warning. Back, now, to the limits. Answer my last question.”

“Yes, I think I would accept waiting a day.”

“And a week?”

Jude’s eyes grew wide. “I... would prefer not to, but it isn’t a limit.”

Cardan, alert to the smallest minutiae of Jude’s actions, noticed as she shifted near imperceptibly closer to him. He smiled inwardly. What this small action conveyed to him was that his plan to make Jude desperate for his attentions, both sexual and non, before they even began was beginning to work.

“And if I wanted to brand you?”

“Limit.”

Cardan grinned, having known, of course, that this would be the answer.

“And there, my dear, is an example.”

Jude rolled her eyes. “I’m sorry that I needed to make clear that ‘permanent disfigurement’ is off the table.”

“You need to make everything clear, Jude, to reduce the possibility of my doing something that genuinely distresses you. And,” he said, growing serious, “I will allow it for now, but when we are done with writing and discussions and begin in earnest, I will expect a more respectful tone from you than that.”

“And if I don’t, you’ll punish me?”

Cardan could hear in Jude’s voice that her reply was no form of backtalk, but one of apprehension and excitement.

“Yes, Jude,” Cardan said, leaning closer once more. “I will punish you, and you will not enjoy it.”

“And if I do?”

Cardan frowned. “It is... a complicated line, to answer you with honesty. I want you to enjoy all that we do, because that is the main purpose of all of this. My role, above all else, is to protect and care for you while putting you in positions of vulnerability, and to make sure that the things we do while I am in control serve you well. However, a part of your enjoyment and powerlessness will be the knowledge that when you transgress, you will be corrected, and that the correction will make you want to avoid repeating the offense. So while I want you to enjoy the process, I do not expect you always to enjoy the particular instance of punishment. Confirm whether or not that makes sense to you.” This was Cardan’s attempt to help Jude grow used to following orders, and it succeeded as she obeyed without question on this small matter.

“Yes, it makes sense.”

Cardan saw Jude rub her legs together, almost too lightly to be noticeable, and smiled.

“Growing a bit desperate, are we?”

Jude scowled, then realized herself and schooled her face into neutrality. Cardan smiled wider at this indication that she was beginning to behave.

“Are you trying the teasing thing now? _Trying_ to make me desperate?”

“Oh, Jude. If and when I tease you, I strongly suspect you shall know. No, when we finish this,” and he waved the paper and pen, “I will make sure your desperation is alleviated.”

“Then let’s get back to work.”

“Begging?”

Jude scoffed again, then looked guiltily at Cardan. It would take some time to break her of these habits, and Cardan fully expected to enjoy every moment of doing so.

“You are free to try to make me beg,” she replied, opting for a neutral statement that still conveyed her derisiveness.

Cardan smiled. “I love a challenge,” he retorted, “thought I doubt that it will be one after I have brought you to the appropriate headspace.”

“What does that mean?”

Cardan set down the paper and turned toward her for this section of the explanation.

“Sometimes, during arrangements such as the one we’re forming-“ At this, Jude raised her eyebrows, reminding him that this arrangement was far from settled.

“The one I hope to form,” he corrected himself. “During these arrangements, there is a certain state of mind you can enter. I have done it at the hands of others- it is a most wondrous, delightful feeling, as though everything in the world is taken care of and the person in control can do no wrong. I tell you this in advance of its happening because I want you to know that I in no way am provoking this state in you for my own gain, or so that you will think more highly of me. I do it because I want you to feel that incredible feeling, and to feel that you are safe and cherished. Do you understand?”

Jude nodded, but then a shadow passed over her face, as though thinking of something she would rather not.

“How do you know all of this? Who made you feel that way? Have you made others feel that way before?”

The jealousy present in her tone was uncharacteristic, and Cardan couldn’t help experiencing a rush of pleasure as he heard it.

“I have a good deal of experience with the topic, and a good deal of knowledge in how it can go poorly,” he answered with a sad smile. “There was a time when, in search of that feeling, I would entrust myself to anyone willing to help me. Many of them took advantage of the situation to cause me pain, not that I can say I didn’t often deserve it. But this is my promise to you, Jude - I will cause you pain, but it will never be more than you can tolerate, it will never be emotional pain, if I can prevent it, and it will never be for the reason that I want you to genuinely suffer. If I punish you, it is to correct you, and if I hurt you because I want to, it is for both of our pleasures.”

“But to your other question. Yes, I have made others feel this way, but never one who I... cared for, as I care for you. It will be entirely different. I hope you can believe that.”

“Nicasia?” was all she replied, unwilling, of course, to acknowledge the depth of feeling in his statement.

“Among others.”

Jude nodded, apparently satisfied for now with his answers.

“I think I understand the limits now. I would not like to be permanently disfigured,” she said with a pointed look, “nor would I like to be overly disgusted by anything we should do.”

“Elaborate.” He knew this would be a challenge for Jude, to speak explicitly about her likes and dislikes.

“I would not like... spit,” she said, “if that was even an option. Nor would I appreciate an excess of any fluid to touch me. I would like to remain relatively clean. Is that—“ Jude caught herself about to ask if that was acceptable and stopped there, frowning as it came to her attention that she had already begun to enter a place of asking his approval.

“Yes,” Cardan answered, as if she had finished the question. “Very good. Lie on your back.”

Jude tentatively did as instructed.

Cardan leaned over her, bringing his mouth to her breast and pressing light kisses along its top, still working through the fabric of her dress. His tongue moved lower to circle her nipple before he sucked it into his mouth, hard. Jude gasped in pleasure and Cardan hummed against her tender flesh.

He pulled back, but left a hand lingering on her cheek. “When you do as you are instructed, you are rewarded,” he said lightly, before returning to the paper. Jude tried to sit up with him, but he held up a hand.

“I want you in that position until I indicate otherwise.”

Jude lay back down.

“Good,” said Cardan with a smile. “Now. Any other limits you can think of currently? It is completely understandable if not, and we can add more at any time.”

Jude shook her head.

“Then we will move on to apprehensions. What are you apprehensive about going into this?”

Jude thought for a moment before replying.

“Vulnerability,” she said slowly. “Putting faith in someone other than myself, not that I even have too much of that in myself lately.” She turned her head away after speaking, realizing she had shared more than she meant to.

Cardan reached over to take her hand gently. “Keep going.”

“Being without weapons, without defenses. Being in a situation where I need to be protected. Being in a situation where I can’t protect you.” The apprehensions came out of her in a rush now, to Cardan’s relief.

“I’m also apprehensive that I will be bad at this, that I won’t be able to bring myself to be obedient and that you will quickly tire of trying to correct me.”

“Oh, Jude. I will never tire of correcting you, and you never need worry that you will be too disobedient. You have already shown me, given your actions of tonight alone, that you will be good at this, not that there is even a way you could be bad.”

Jude shot Cardan a quick grateful look before continuing.

“I’m apprehensive that this is going to make me seem weak.”

“To me?”

“To you, to the kingdom. To anyone who knows.”

“No one will know without your express permission, Jude. Besides, who would I tell?” Cardan spoke the words with some bitterness, reminding Jude that he had few people in his life besides her. The thought crossed her mind that she should endeavor to treat him slightly more kindly, as he had her.

“Those are all of my apprehensions for now,” was all she said. “What else do you need to write down?”

“You need two words - one which stops everything we are doing completely, and one which signals me to make sure you are okay before we continue.”

“Nicasia and Locke.” She answered without hesitation.

“Fitting,” Cardan said, amused. “Our ex lovers.” He hurriedly wrote down her answers before continuing.

“What shall you call me?”

“Cardan, perhaps?” she answered sarcastically.

Cardan frowned at her.

“A name which denotes respect, Jude. May I suggest ‘My Lord’ or ‘My King’? I won’t make you go so far as to call me master.”

“My Lord,” Jude replied after a brief moment of consideration.

“Good. For the rest of the night and day, from this moment on, you will address me as ‘My Lord’. You will respond to my questions with answers like ‘Yes, My Lord’ and ‘No, My Lord.’ Is that clear?”

“Yes, My Lord.” Jude said quietly. Cardan leaned down and pressed a soft kiss to her lips.

“Good. That concludes the information I need to gather for now. I will store this sheet safely for future use.”

“You seem quite confident that there will be future use.”

Cardan raised an eyebrow but let the disrespect in her tone slide. “I think you need this, Jude, and I think you will come to realize that by the end of the time you’ve allotted me. Another thing to note is that from this moment forward, I will not take your disrespect quite so lightly.”

Jude nodded once, and Cardan seized her chin in his hand once more.

“Say, ‘yes, My Lord’.”

“Yes, My Lord,” Jude replied, averting her eyes, still unable to believe she had put herself in this position.

Cardan smiled. “So far, you have been fairly obedient, and completed all that I’ve asked of you with a minimum of complaint. Frankly, I’m impressed, and I do plan to reward you.”

Jude shivered.

“But first, I want to address something you said earlier, about my viewing you as weak. Jude, to submit to my control will be the ultimate show of strength. I know what it would take from you, and how bold you will have to be in order to do so. I will never, _never_ think you weak for giving up a small piece of your power. I will see you as all the more powerful for it, do you understand?”

“Yes, My Lord,” she said quietly.

“Good. Then let us begin.” With that, Cardan returned his mouth to Jude’s breast, licking and sucking over the fabric of her dress as his hands inched the bottom upward, baring her upper thighs. He finally pulled back to remove her dress entirely and stayed hovering above her, gazing down at her near-naked form.

“Tell me what you think of your body, Jude.”

Jude blanched, and Cardan could see the panic in her eyes, wondered if he had gone too far. Then, though, she reminded herself of his prior words - that this was strength, power, not weakness and defeat.

“I think it is strong, and serves its purpose, but is out of place among those of the faeries. You are all so... well, thin, and I am not. I have always wished to look as you do, despite knowing I never can.”

Cardan nodded, having suspected exactly this response.

“And would you like to know what I think of your body, Jude?”

“Yes, My Lord.”

“I think your body far surpasses the beauty of that of any faerie I have ever seen. I think there is nothing more attractive to me than your muscles and flesh. I think that the more of you there is for me to touch,” and he touched her, “kiss,” and he kissed her, “and caress the more I will be satisfied. And I think that your body gives you life, and that is the most beautiful thing of all. After the undersea, when you had so little flesh on your bones, I was terrified. I would never want to see you like that again. I am grateful for every day that you have enough to eat, and I count myself lucky to share the bed of someone strong enough to snap my body in a heartbeat.”

Jude laughed at this. “I meant what I said, though. I wouldn’t kill you.”

Cardan put his hand over his chest and said with mock sincerity, “and you have no idea what that means to me,” but they both knew it was far from sarcasm.

“Thank you,” Jude said softly, “my lord, for what you said.”

“I speak only the truth, unlike some,” he replied, touching her face lightly. “Anyway, Jude, would you like me to return to the task at hand?”

“Very much so — my lord.” He heard her stumble, forget herself for a moment, and resolved to push her deeper into the headspace she so desperately needed to enter.

He started by kissing his way down her stomach, running his tongue along the bones of her hips, the line of her pelvis. He nipped the skin of her inner thigh gently, causing her to yelp, and grinned against her.

Finally — finally — he attended to her burning need, pulling her remaining underwear down her legs and situating himself between them. He heard her give a sharp intake of breath as she realized what he was going to do, as she did every time they did this, and smiled once more at the familiarity of the situation.

With one hand, Cardan spread Jude before him, as he pressed his tongue against her folds.

“Spread your legs for me, Jude, dear,” he muttered against her, and she squirmed even as she did as he asked. Demanded.

When she had obeyed, he resumed his actions in earnest, licking and sucking with vigor, trying to bring her to the edge as quickly as possible. He entered her with two fingers so suddenly that she gasped in surprise, and he pulled back to grin up at her and gaze at her flushed cheeks and half-closed eyes.

“Your nipples. Touch them,” he commanded, and she did as instructed, pulling and rolling them between her fingers, moaning lightly at the sensation and more loudly as he curled his fingers inside her, still watching.

“You are stunning,” he said simply, before resuming the work of his mouth against her. He flicked her clit with his tongue, slowly at first, but increased speed with his tongue and fingers until she was on the edge, crying out that she was about to go over it.

He stopped all motions, pulled back, and said, “hands at your sides.”

“I thought this was a reward,” she said, anger flashing in her eyes even as she obeyed.

“It is,” he replied. “The reward is the fact that I’m touching you at all. And I don’t appreciate your attitude. Spread your legs.”

She had snapped them closed in the wake of his motions ceasing, but opened them again now. Cardan pushed them farther apart roughly.

“In the future, know that it is my right to stop touching you at any time, and that you have no leave to contest my decision. I won’t fully punish you now, because this is a first infraction, but I will give you a small reminder of your place.”

With those words, he slapped her directly on the junction between her legs, one of his many rings hitting her clit. While he congratulated himself on his excellent aim, Jude cried out in shock and pain.

“Car— My—“ she sputtered, trying to find something to say that wouldn’t provoke another slap. Cardan merely raised an eyebrow, waiting for her decision.

She stayed silent, biting her lip against the desire to protest and the residual stinging between her legs.

Cardan looked down at her. “Next time, your punishment will not be so easy to bear. And before I forget, there is a rule I want to set for the future- you ask me, rather than tell me, when you are close to orgasm. Do you understand?”

Jude closed her eyes briefly before responding. “Yes, My Lord.”

Cardan could see the struggle in Jude, sense the way she worked to control the impulse to resist him, and found himself impossibly proud.

He lay down beside her and began steadily stroking a finger in circles around her clit, so slowly that there was no risk of her coming from the stimulation. Jude bit her lip and moaned.

“Normally, at a time like this, I would be waiting for you to beg,” Cardan said conversationally, as if discussing the weather in Elfhame. “But, as circumstance has it, begging will do nothing for you here. I plan to let you come—“ with those words, Jude’s wide eyes shot to his, but he continued with a small smile “but not for some time.”

Jude’s face fell, but lacked the spark of anger it had earlier held. Good. That meant she was beginning to accept that she had no choice but to allow Cardan to do what he would with her pleasure.

He continued his gentle ministrations on her clit, listening for small moans and breathy sighs as she wished for more stimulation, for several minutes. Then, without warning, he rose.

“Get dressed,” he ordered.

“Why?” she asked, even as she stood from the bed.

Cardan raised an eyebrow by way of answer, and Jude paled.

“I will, My Lord.”

Cardan knew that Jude was likely still allowing this sort of behavior from herself by rationalizing that it was only for the night, but it still pleased him to see signs of her growing obedience.

Jude had dresses in one of the many closets contained by Cardan’s chambers, for those times when hers became rumpled and dirty and she didn’t want anyone to know what she had been doing or with whom. She pulled one on now, not bothering to search for a bra, knowing Cardan would likely stop her anyway. She did, however, pick her underwear back up from where Cardan had carelessly discarded it earlier, but he tsked and plucked it from her hands.

“Not tonight,” he said decisively, and she had no choice but to obey.

When she was dressed and had smoothed down her hair enough to be presentable to... wherever it was they were going, Cardan led Jude from the chambers and into the halls of the palace. When they reached the throne room, a horrible thought occurred to Jude. Surely, _surely_ , Cardan didn’t expect her to spend hours on the throne as she usually did at night, watching revelers and hearing complaints from the citizens of Elfhame. Surely he wouldn’t be so cruel, when she could still feel the wetness between her thighs and knew her clit remained as swollen as ever.

But he was so cruel, and in they went to settle on the twin thrones, side by side, perhaps an inch of space between the two seats.

“Bring a table,” he ordered loudly to the room, “with a cloth.”

Cardan was quickly obeyed, and a table was set before their thrones on the dais, covered in a white cloth that reached to the floor. To Jude’s shock, Cardan actually thanked the faeries that delivered the table. He was clearly on his best behavior in an attempt to convince her that this was a worthy arrangement.

Jude had no idea why Cardan would request a table when, again to her shock, he did not appear to be drinking. His reason soon became apparent, though, as his hand slipped across the space between their thrones and under her dress once more, blocked from the sight of the room’s revelers by the cloth on the table.

She realized at that moment that Cardan planned to keep her on the edge of orgasm for the entire duration of their time in the throne room, and closed her eyes as a flush began to rise on her face.

“My lord,” she said, too quietly for anyone but Cardan to hear her. “I don’t know if I can do this.”

“You can,” he responded, “because I know your limits, and because I am telling you that you can, and because you want to please me.”

Jude was surprised to find that she did, indeed want to please him.

“My lord,” she started again, “you aren’t drinking. I was just wondering why.”

Cardan’s face grew serious. “As greatly as it pains me to go a night sober, I don’t believe in engaging in this sort of... activity while intoxicated. One of my main responsibilities is to ensure that I can read you well enough to know your limits, and I can’t easily do so with an alcohol addled mind.”

Jude nodded, touched and realizing for the first time that Cardan’s role in this was as difficult, if not more so, as hers.

“So, in the hypothetical and far from plausible situation that we made this arrangement permanent...”

“I would still drink on occasion, but any rewards, punishments, commands, or otherwise would wait until my sobriety.”

Jude found herself slightly disappointed. She wouldn’t admit it to him, but she worried about his drinking, about the fact that his drunken state seemed the only time he even bordered on happiness. Not that she did much to help with the misery he experienced in life.

All thoughts shattered in Jude’s mind as Cardan brought her nearly over the edge once more.

“My Lord, can I-“

He pulled away.

Had they not been in the middle of a room full of faeries, Jude might have cried out in frustration.

They passed the next hour in silence, Cardan bringing Jude to the edge again every time she got far enough from it to be comfortable. She spent the hour in misery, near writhing in her seat from the arousal. She knew she would have a damp spot on the back of her dress when they finally left the throne room, and couldn’t bring herself to care. She couldn’t even care, in fact, that all of this was happening publicly, and that someone could rise too high on the dais and see what Cardan’s hand occupied itself with at any moment.

“Alright, Jude,” Cardan said loudly, finally taking pity on her. “Let us retire for the rest of the night.”

Jude sighed in relief and stood, following Cardan out of the throne room. When they reached his chambers, Jude had no time to react as Cardan pinned her to the wall, holding her wrists above her head.

“You’re mine, Jude,” he said, stroking her wrists with his thumbs. “I love having you as my own, to do what I will with. You have no idea how deliciously appealing you looked on the dais, sitting in your throne and letting me touch you like the slut you are quickly, beautifully becoming. Tell me - are you enjoying yourself?”

“No, My Lord.”

“Are you lying?”

“Yes, My Lord.”

Cardan smiled. “It’s not nice to lie, Jude.” He slapped her in the face, hard enough to sting and take her by surprise but softly enough not to leave a mark. Jude exclaimed in surprise.

Cardan knew he had taken a risk, that face slapping was something they had not discussed and something with which Jude might be wholly uncomfortable, but she said nothing, merely looked at the floor in guilt.

And she did feel guilty — guilty for lying to him about her enjoyment in one last, desperate attempt to pretend this wasn’t exactly what she needed, that she couldn’t already feel a glimmer of the feeling Cardan had described, that she wasn’t close to total surrender.

“Look at me,” Cardan said softly.

Jude looked at him, biting her lip gently, willing him to forgive.

“There’s something important which I neglected to tell you.” He continued stroking her wrists in small, reassuring circles. “After I have punished you for whatever infraction you’ve committed, it’s over. I harbor no more negative feelings about it, and you have no more repentance to do unless I explicitly tell you otherwise. A punishment is an absolution.”

“Yes, My Lord,” Jude said, lifting her head in an attempt to push the conflict from her mind. “I will not lie again.” She meant the promise.

Cardan bowed his head. “Noted and appreciated,” he said, before looking up at her, sternly but with mischief on his face.

“Now. Get on your knees.”

Jude dropped to her knees immediately, growing more and more eager to please, and reached up to undo the buttons of his breeches.

“No,” he said, and stilled her hands. “Take off your dress.”

She obeyed, sliding it over her head eagerly and casting it aside, leaving herself naked before him once more.

Cardan cast his own shirt over his head and undid his breeches himself, much to Jude’s disappointment, before sliding off the remainder of his clothes.

“Start slowly, and using only your mouth.”

Jude obeyed, leaning forward to kiss her way up and down the length of him, pausing to give particular attention to the head before moving back down. Cardan braced a hand against the wall behind her.

“Lick me. Stay slow, but be thorough.”

Jude did as instructed once more, licking and gently sucking her way around his cock, over the head, pausing to swirl her tongue around his balls.

After several minutes, Cardan gave his next order.

“Pull as much of me as you can into your mouth. You may use your hands now, and do go a bit more quickly.”

Jude smiled, hearing the effect she had on him in his voice, and proceeded to do as told, sucking him into her mouth and blowing him in earnest.

Cardan’s sounds were like a reward, as they always were on the rare occasions that she did this, and she smiled as she worked on him, desperately wanting to bring him over the edge, desperately wanting to please.

“Jude,” he groaned, “yes, yes, like that.”

Quickly, Cardan went over the edge, spilling come into Jude’s mouth which she swallowed diligently before wiping her face with her hand. She smiled up at him when she finished, a mixture of sweetness and wicked pleasure on her face.

“Evil, talented girl,” was all he said before pulling her to her feet and pushing her across the room, onto the bed. “It’s my turn now.”

Jude did not point out that Cardan had, in fact, taken many turns already, merely lay on her back awaiting him. When he arrived, he quickly got back to the task at hand, spreading her legs and using his tongue to work her clit, alternating speeds to keep her from coming to the edge too quickly.

Still— after hours of torment, it was a matter of moments before she was at the edge, legs trembling hard beneath Cardan’s hands.

“May I come, My Lord, may I come?” she pleaded, close to begging, desperation evident in her voice.

“Yes,” he paused just long enough to say before resuming his ministrations.

He didn’t stop, nor even slow down, as she came, crying out and tangling her hands in his hair, chanting his name and “my lord” and “god, god, god” intermittently. Nor did he slow down when she came a second time, writhing beneath him. By the time she neared a third orgasm without a break, Jude had tears of pleasure and overstimulation in her eyes and was pleading with Cardan alternately to stop and keep going. He chose to continue, and she came four times before Cardan finally slowed to a stop and pulled back to look at her.

Cardan moved to the top of the bed and pulled Jude into his arms, head resting on his chest. She let out a slight whimper of protest, a part of her uncomfortable with this level of intimacy, but was too spent and needed to be held too badly to resist.

“Are you in a space where you can listen to me, my darling Jude?” Cardan asked, so heartbreakingly gentle in voice and touch that she felt as though her chest was cracking.

“Mm hmm,” she said in assent.

“Another important thing to remember about what we’re doing is that you must allow me to care for you. This is undeniably important. This sort of... play, if we might call it that, can only happen with the knowledge that I will care for you afterward. You cannot protest when I pull you into my arms after whatever we’ve been doing, whether punishment or pleasure. You cannot prevent me from tending to any injuries I may have caused or ensuring your safety, health, and wellbeing. If it is my responsibility to correct you, and to keep safely your power, then it is also my responsibility to care for you, and I take it quite seriously. Do you understand?”

“Yes, My Lord, I understand,” Jude tried to say, but it came out more like “hmmlord derstand.”

Cardan smiled tenderly down at Jude, and knew in that moment that he was much farther gone than he had ever suspected when it came to his feelings for the woman he held.

Jude, for her part, was terrified. Since her return from exile, she had never allowed herself this kind of intimacy with Cardan, and she was shocked by how desperately she desired it. She was mentally and bodily exhausted and wanted nothing more than to fall asleep in his arms, but her mind would not allow her that, setting off all the warning bells of the danger she could be getting herself into by allowing this, and with him.

But she had promised to be honest, and knew that he would consider keeping her thoughts a secret when they needed to be shared a lie of omission, so she spoke.

“I’m afraid,” she said.

“I know,” he replied, and for a moment they were silent. “I don’t want to put pressure on you, but if you’ll give me the time to do this right, I’ll prove to you that you have nothing to be afraid of.”

Jude opened her eyes. “I want to,” she whispered, as though saying something shameful. “I don’t want this to end, but I don’t know if I can do it.”

“I do. I know.”

“Where did this resounding faith in my strength come from?” Jude’s words were teasing, but her sentiment was genuine.

“I’ve had it for a long time, I think. Since I’ve known you. I was cruel to you in part because it was easier than acknowledging my feelings and in part because I saw strength in you where in myself there was only weakness, and I hated you for that.”

For reasons Jude could not understand, the reminder that Cardan had ever hated her nearly brought tears to her eyes at this moment, but she remained silent as he continued.

“I now see that hating you for your strength was the solution of a child. You have my apologies and my regret.”

They both were silent, unspoken emotion crackling between them, for several minutes.

“Why can’t this be easy?” Jude said at last.

“It’s not too late,” Cardan whispered, and kissed the top of Jude’s head, the mortal curve of her ear, the tip of her nose. “Jude, admit that you need this.”

“I do, but that doesn’t mean I get to have it when it feels like giving up all that I’ve worked for.”

Cardan closed his eyes in frustration. “You’re giving up nothing, Jude! You would only be gaining a new form of freedom. You lose nothing by surrendering.”

“I lose the war between us.”

“What war!” Cardan exclaimed, raking his hands through his hair. “The war of children? The war of two people who have been horrible to each other and now have a chance to be good? There is no war for me, Jude - not any more.”

Jude was choking back tears now, impossibly distressed at having gone from the sweetness of a few moments ago to the harsh reality of their situation and of Cardan’s frustration with her.

“I’m sorry,” she started, but then Cardan was there and he was holding her again and comforting her and kissing her temples and oh god, Jude had never been so overwhelmed by emotion and sensation and desire.

“No, Jude, do not apologize. It was my responsibility to keep myself calm after putting you into that emotional place and I failed. The responsibility is mine, and I am truly sorry.”

Jude didn’t cry, not any more, but she came close now, squeezed her eyes shut to hold back the tears, and finally, finally assented.

“I don’t know what I can commit to, and I don’t know that I won’t back out at any moment, because I’m terribly, terribly afraid. What I do know is that I want this, and I’m willing to try.”

“That’s more than I expected from you, Jude,” and she could hear the grateful tone behind his words.

“We can try it all the time, if you still want to.” The words came out of Jude in a rush of nervousness, and Cardan took her trembling hands in his own.

“I would love to, Jude. Go get the paper and pen from earlier.”

“Yes, My Lord,” she said, already relieved to be back to this, showing her just how badly she did need this arrangement.

She returned with the paper, which Cardan quickly signed at the bottom.

“Sign this when you’re truly ready to begin,” he said. “I won’t rush you. You can take all the time you—“

Decisively, Jude signed the document.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> She rolled onto her back, unable to refrain from whimpering in pain. For a brief, terrible moment, she remembered herself, remembered that she was Jude Duarte and that she had to be strong and powerful over all and that she could not whimper in the bed of Cardan Greenbriar, but then his hands were on her flesh and all worries were forgotten.

Jude, of course, had heard of BDSM before. She had seen television and movies and was no stranger to the concept, but it had always appeared so foreign, scenes of dungeons, whips, and chains. And although the thought of those things, once alien, now excited her, she realized that BDSM, whether called by that name or not, was an entire world of actions and situations, and that the gentle care with which Cardan treated her, even when causing her pain, was an integral part of it.

Unfortunately, Cardan and Jude had few opportunities to engage in their newly solidified arrangement in the coming days, due to the discovery brought to their attention mere moments after Jude signed the document.

A messenger arrived at the door minutes after Jude put down her pen, interrupting a heated kiss between the King and Queen. Both dressed hurriedly, and when Cardan answered, the shock of seeing Jude in his chambers flitted over the messenger’s face briefly before dissipating, replaced by a grave expression.

“I come bearing unfortunate news,” he began. “It seems that a faerie, as yet unidentified, has been slaughtering others. There have been several confirmed murders and a number of other disappearances.”

Jude’s mind couldn’t help but wander to the fact that no one had ever come after her inquiring about Valerian’s “disappearance.” Normally, Faeries didn’t take murder quite so seriously — the numbers of the dead must be high for such a matter to have reached the level of the rulers.

“How many murders?” Jude asked.

“Fifty, your majesty. Many of the victims trained fighters.”

Jude closed her eyes in shock. Fifty deaths, and who knew how many disappearances, and they still hadn’t caught the faerie responsible? Jude plotted how to discover the identity of the faerie, how she could most quickly contact the Bomb and the Roach, what she would do when she laid her hands on the one responsible…

Cardan dealt with the messenger, explaining that they would do anything in their power to support the capture of the murderous faerie.

As soon as the door closed, Cardan turned to Jude.  
“I know your expression well. You are forbidden, _absolutely_ forbidden, from going after the faerie alone, do you understand? I’m sure you will insist on accompanying whatever party we send to retrieve whoever is responsible, and I know you seem to think yourself invincible, but if you go after him death will seem preferable to what I do to you.”

Jude swallowed hard. “I understand, My Lord,” she said, trying her hardest to adapt to her new role, to obey the commands of the one person she had decided to allow a modicum of power over her.

She failed.

As soon as the Bomb told her, a week later, that she had learned who was responsible for the killings, all thought of obedience slipped from Jude’s mind.

It was in this way that she now found herself pulling on boots and slipping from her chambers, sword at her hip. She and Cardan were still not sharing chambers, because their new arrangement had in no way lessened her fear of true intimacy, and they had no time over the past week spent hunting a murderer to engage in any activity which could lead to her sleeping over. So Jude found it simple to slip from the palace and into the night.

She found the faerie — female, from the look of her — poised to commit yet another murder, knife raised high, and realized that the faerie was dressed in some shimmering, reflective material that must have made her near impossible to identify. That explained why it had taken so long to catch her, and why only the Court of Shadows could manage it.

Jude drew her sword silently and made to plunge it into the back of the faerie, a quick, easy kill, but to her shock, the faerie swung around at the last moment and blocked her with only a knife.

They hadn’t been exaggerating the faerie’s skill, and Jude realized with a start that she might be in true danger, despite her own skill level.

Jude’s rationalization for going after the faerie alone had been that only she could be silent, quick, _dangerous_ enough to catch her, and that anyone else would only slow her down, make the faerie harder to trap. She now realized that, while all were true, her reasons may not be enough to save her.

A fight ensued, of course. Jude got in a few solid blows — a slice on the thigh, a shallow jab in the stomach — and began to feel that she had the upper hand until the faerie feigned right, stabbed left, and Jude found herself with a stinging cut on her ribs.

She regained her footing and the fight continued. They were evenly matched until they weren’t, when Jude twirled her wrist in the way Madoc taught her and stabbed the faerie through the stomach. She bled out quickly.

It was then that Jude’s fear kicked in, that she realized what she had done and what Cardan would do to her for it. She was glad to have killed the faerie, proud of her skill, but she knew that Cardan would not view her reckless actions in the same way.

Before Jude had killed the faerie, she had gotten in a second blow, leaving Jude with a sliced side and a hearty bruise blooming on her upper arm. There would be no way to hide her injuries from Cardan, not to mention that she had been sprayed with the faerie’s blood. Her best bet was to tell him exactly what she had done and beg forgiveness — not that she expected to gain leniency from doing so.

When she returned she went straight to Cardan’s chambers, head down. She entered his room, saw him lounging in bed, reading, and dropped to her knees in the center of the room.

Cardan was at her side in an instant.

“What happened?” His voice was urgent, worried.

“I killed the faerie. I went alone, like you ordered me not to. I don’t regret it, but I know you have to punish me.”

Cardan was silent for several long moments, moments that seemed to stretch forever ahead of Jude.

When he finally spoke, his voice was heartbreakingly concerned, gentle.

“Jude, you’re bleeding through your shirt.”

Jude looked down. She was, in fact, bleeding through her shirt.

Cardan offered her his hand.

“Stand up,” he ordered.

Jude stood, keeping her head down, eyes averted. Trying to showcase her own obedience and docility, hoping to make Cardan slightly more forgiving.

“You will not convince me to be more lenient,” he said, calling her on her attempt.

Jude nodded.

Cardan took her hand and wordlessly led her to his bath chamber before running a bath.

Jude began to strip herself of her bloody clothing, but Cardan stopped her with a hand on her wrist.

“Let me,” he said, gently but with the force behind it that indicated a command.

She did as instructed and he gingerly removed her shirt, peeling the bloody fabric away from the cut on her side.

“Where are you hurt?”

Jude gestured to her cut side, the more obvious of her wounds, then to the bruise forming on her arm.

“Do you have any idea, Jude, how reckless your decision was? How much worse the situation could have ended?”

“I don’t need to be lectured,” Jude snapped before she could stop herself. Cardan grabbed her chin in his hand, turning her face to his.

“And yet you will be, both lectured and far worse when I’m done cleaning your wounds.”

Jude softened at the reminder that Cardan was caring for her, as much as the independent part of her wanted to rebel at the thought. She lowered her head once more.

“Yes, My Lord.”

Cardan moved his hand from her chin to stroke her hair. “I want you to be safe.”

Jude was reminded, suddenly, that expressing feelings was barely easier for Cardan than for her, and felt immediately guilty that she did not more often appreciate his efforts.

“I know. Thank you,” she said.

“I will save the remainder of my lecture for a more… appropriate time.”

Jude gulped.

“For now, let me help you bathe.”  
Cardan helped Jude into the bath, wincing himself as she hissed at the warm water touching her cut side.

The thought occurred to Jude that he would soon be hurting her far worse than this, and she couldn’t help but laugh at the thought that he winced at her pain now when he was about to cause it in more severe doses.

“What about this is funny?” Cardan asked, his voice full of cold command.

“I’m sorry, My Lord,” she said. “I was thinking of the fact that you care about my pain now when you are about to cause me pain deliberately.”

Cardan closed his eyes in frustration. She could tell he wanted to snap at her, but he controlled his anger.

“That,” he said, “is an entirely different situation. When I punish you in this context, it is not because I want to see you hurt, and I am deliberately controlling the pain I inflict so as not to actually injure you. When a murderous faerie gashes your side, it is quite another matter, and one of which I am far less comfortable.”

Jude bowed her head once more. “I understand.”

With every moment that Jude bathed she grew more and more apprehensive. She had never been punished in this form, and though she had found throughout her life that she had a notably high tolerance for extreme pain, she did not know how well she would cope with prolonged, steady pain. She wondered where this would fall on that line.

“Are you afraid, Jude?” Cardan asked as he helped her out of the bath. “Because you should be.”

Jude gritted her teeth so as not to retort, to say something sharp and biting for the purpose of hiding her own anxiety as Cardan began bandaging her wounds.

As soon as he finished and they exited the bathing chambers, Cardan sat on the edge of the bed and pulled a still-naked Jude to lie on her front over his lap, careful to avoid putting pressure on her cut or bruise.

“I think that you don’t yet understand why I have to do what I am about to, but I suspect that you soon will.”

With those words, Cardan’s hand came down on Jude’s bare flesh, and she yelped at the sting of the first strike. Still, it didn’t hurt nearly as badly as she had been expecting, and she began to relax at the thought that this might not be as bad as she thought.

After the 10th slap, though, she began to wonder if she was wrong.

Cardan hit hard and fast, varying his rhythm and location randomly so she could never guess where or when the next slap would land.

After 20 strokes, Jude began to squirm. Cardan laughed.

“There’s no point in squirming yet, my dear Jude. You won’t escape my blows, nor will I lighten them for quite some time. This punishment will be hard to bear, but far less severe than it would be had you received many punishments in the past. Consider yourself lucky.”

Jude did not.

After 30 strokes, Cardan began to lecture.

“There is no reason, and no excuse, for you to act autonomously all of the time. You are not alone in this world, nor will I allow you to pretend that you are, that you can rely only on yourself. You could have told me when you discovered the identity of the faerie, or you could have brought the Court of Shadows with you, or you could have told _anyone_ rather than go alone and risk your life. This kingdom needs its queen just as I do.”

“Do you have any idea how much I worry? How desperately I wish you would confide in me rather than act on your own? You are never, l _never_ to do something like this again, do you understand me?”

As Cardan spoke, his slaps grew harder, until Jude was crying out after each one.

“Ow, oh god, I’m sorry, Cardan, My Lord, I mean,” Jude rambled as Cardan reached 60 strokes and her ass felt like it was on fire.

“Are you? Truly, are you sorry?”

“I am! I didn’t know… OW, oh, My Lord, OW!”

“You didn’t know what?” Here he paused the spanks, waiting to give her space to reply.

Jude breathed heavily. “I didn’t know anyone cared.”

Cardan slapped her again, harder than ever, on the spot where her thigh met her ass.

“You should have,” was all he said. “Stand up.”

Jude obeyed, infinitely grateful that it was finally over, but as if sensing her thoughts, Cardan said, “oh no, this isn’t over yet, my dear Jude.”

Jude’s stomach dropped to the floor. She didn’t want to use her safe word, but was unsure how much more she could take.

When Cardan returned, it was with a wide, flat-backed hairbrush that Jude had used many times before leaving his chambers to make her hair appear as though she wasn’t freshly fucked.

“Just 25 strokes with this, and then we’re done. I want you to count them.”

Jude lay dutifully back over Cardan’s lap when indicated, still afraid that even 25 would be too much for her to handle.

He slapped her once with the brush, and she cried out the moment it made impact. “One,” she said, voice cracking slightly.

“Two!” she cried as the second slap landed. “Three, four, five!” landed in quick succession, making it almost impossible to catch her breath.

After landing the fifth smack, Cardan paused to rub her back soothingly as she breathed.

“I’m disappointed in what you did, but you’re taking this well, Jude. I’m proud that you have given me the honor of punishing you at all.”

Jude felt herself swell with pride at his compliment, so desperate was she for any positive attention, both in this moment and, more broadly, in her life.

The feeling dissipated as he resumed her punishment, to be replaced sheerly by pain.

“Six! Seven! My Lord, I don’t know how much more I can take,” Jude gasped out, breathing hard.

“I do,” said Cardan. “Trust that I know what’s best for you, Jude, and exactly how much you can take. 18 more strokes and we’re done.”

“Eight! Nine! Ten!” she counted, resolving to take the remainder stoically. Still, she couldn’t stop her hand from darting behind her as she felt him raise the brush for the eleventh stroke.

He seized her wrist in his free hand and twisted it behind her back, hard. She cried out.

“Jude, the entire purpose of this punishment is to prevent you from doing things that could injure you, and you persist in doing those things. If I hit your wrist with this brush I could bruise or break it. Do not,” and he punctuated these words with a hard slap of the brush, “move your hand again.”

“Yes, My Lord! Eleven!” she cried out, leaving her hand where he had placed it and not moving it again.

Twelve, Thirteen, and Fourteen followed without incident, but after Fifteen, Jude was certain she could take no more.

“My Lord I can’t I can’t Ican’tIcan’tIcan’t” she chanted, wriggling to try to escape without moving her hands.

“You can,”

“Sixteen!”

“And you will.”

“Seventeen! Eighteen! Nineteen!”

After Twenty, Cardan paused to rub her back once more.

“The last five will be the hardest and the fastest and you do not have to count them, but you do have to assure me that you will neither attempt to move your hands nor to wriggle away. I could injure you if you fail to obey. Can you assure me of that?”  
“Yes, My Lord. I will remain still.”  
“Good girl,” he said, and something in her felt like it was blooming at the praise, despite her current situation. He had never, never called her something like that before, and she found that she quite liked it.

The last five slaps came one after another, and Jude cried out loudly when each hit landed, but she did not use her safe word or wriggle away. When he finished, she lay trying to catch her breath for several minutes as he rubbed her back consolingly.

“I will never,” she said when she finally came back to herself, “try to hunt down and kill a murderous faerie again.”

“Jude,” he said, voice warning even as he smiled at her attempt at humor.

“I mean it,” she said more softly. “I won’t do something like that again. I mean it.” Her tone begged him to believe her, and he did.

“Good. Stand up.”

She stood, eyes shut against tears as they had been for the last five strokes. Cardan endeavored, in that moment, to one day make her cry. He knew it was something she needed, whether or not she would ever admit it. To cry in front of him would be, for Jude, the ultimate show of trust.

He moved over on the bed to give Jude room.

“Come here,” he said, voice gentle now, any trace of punishing command absent from it.

Jude crawled into bed gingerly, so as not to brush her hot, red flesh on the sheets, and settled against his chest as she knew that he — and, if she were to admit it to herself, she — wanted.

“Do you want to know, Jude, the more selfish of reasons I had for being upset with you for going alone to kill the faerie?”

“What?”

“Because I need you. Because it has become readily apparent to me that you are, in fact, not the sickness, but that you were the cure all along, the cure for something I never realized was keeping me ill. Do not endanger yourself again.” 

Jude could hear the worry in his voice and felt the guilt flood her once more, before he grabbed her chin and tilted her head up to face him. “At the same time, I told you that punishments are absolutions. You have no cause to feel guilt. You have suffered the consequences of your actions, and the situation is over now. The situation is over, do you understand?”

Jude felt, in that moment, an utter freedom, the freedom that came from being absolved of something she had until this moment not even realized the extent of her guilt about. The feeling of being cherished, and being needed, and being seen.

“I understand, My Lord. Thank you.” _Thank you_ , she thought. _Thank you._

After several minutes, Cardan spoke again.

“Tell me when you have recovered enough to continue, Jude, for I have more in store for you yet.”

“More punishment?” she asked, panicked, then added, “My Lord?”

“Of a sort, but of the sort that I think you might enjoy greatly, if you allow yourself to.”

Jude was confused, and they lay in silence for several more minutes before she spoke.

“I’m ready, I believe.”

“Roll onto your back.”

She groaned. “But, My Lord, it hurts—“  
“This is not a negotiation, Jude.”

She rolled onto her back, unable to refrain from whimpering in pain. For a brief, terrible moment, she remembered herself, remembered that she was Jude Duarte and that she had to be strong and powerful over all and that she could not whimper in the bed of Cardan Greenbriar, but then his hands were on her flesh and all worries were forgotten.

Cardan ran his hands up her sides, cupping her breasts gently before continuing upward. When he reached the tops of her arms, he lifted them above her head.

“Stay as I position you, and do not move,” he ordered. She did as told, making herself malleable and allowing him to position her as he would.

When he had moved her limbs in such a way that she was spreadeagled on the bed, he stood and walked to the closet. When he returned it was with several lengths of rope and some cloth.

The rope he tied around each wrist and each ankle, before affixing one length of rope to each bedpost. When he finished this task, Jude was spread out and unable to move.

The cloth he tied tightly around her head, covering her eyes completely, so that she could see neither below nor through it.

Jude felt familiar panic creeping in, the panic of being powerless, of being vulnerable, and clenched her hands into fists.

As soon as Cardan noticed her hands, he opened them and massaged them gently.

“What is it, Jude?”

“I can’t see.”

“Yes, well, that was my intention.”

“How will I know what you’re going to do?” Her voice was small.

“Trust me, Jude, please trust me. And if you can’t trust me, remember the words that give you power. If you say Nicasia or Locke, I will stop instantly. I promise you that.”

“I believe you,” she whispered, then steeled herself against her own nerves. “Okay. Continue.”

Without warning, Cardan slapped her breast sharply.

“I believe I am the one who gives the orders.”

“Yes, My Lord,” she breathed, glad to be back to this.

Jude quickly realized, as Cardan kissed lines up and down her stomach, over her breasts, across her chest, that the blindfold added an entire level of sensation to every touch. Without the ability to see, she had only to feel, and feel she did. She felt every minute breath he exhaled against her, every scrape of his teeth on her flesh, every place where his fingers pressed into her skin. He gingerly avoided the cut on her side, instead kissing the area around the bandage.

Suddenly and without warning, Cardan bit down hard on Jude’s breast, sucking her flesh into his mouth and scraping his teeth along it. She cried out in surprise and pleasure.

“I’m going to mark you, Jude,” he said, pressing delicate kisses over the skin he had just bitten. “I’m going to make sure everyone knows who you belong to.”

Cardan bit and sucked across Jude’s breasts until she was peppered with marks and squirming beneath him. The squirming only intensified as he began to involve his nails, scraping them across her skin and over her nipples, digging them into her sides and her throat.

“Is there something you want, my beautiful girl?” he asked, smirking down at her.

“My Lord...” she trailed off, not wanting to speak the words aloud.

“Until you can tell me what you want, you will not have it. For now, may I mark your neck, Jude?”

It was important to Cardan to ask this question because he was still unsure how comfortable Jude would be with the rest of faerie having any sense not even of their arrangement but of the fact that they were involved at all.

Jude, assuming that they would soon figure it out one way or another, assented.

“Yes,” she breathed. “Mark me.”

Cardan did so, bringing his mouth to her throat and sucking on the soft skin there, leaving pink marks everywhere his mouth went. At the same time, he plucked at her nipples, not hard enough to hurt but steadily, insistently.

After several minutes of biting, sucking, marking, Cardan stood. Jude heard the sounds of his clothes being removed and sucked in a breath, hoping beyond hope that what she by this point so desperately wanted was coming.

“Tell me what you want, Jude,” came Cardan’s next words.

“I’m not ready to beg, My Lord,” she said hurriedly, making sure he wasn’t trying to push her that far, push her into something she wouldn’t be able to cope with.

“And I’m not asking you to,” he said. “Just tell me,” and he punctuated the words with a pinch of her nipple, eliciting a gasp, “what you want.”

“I want you to fuck me.”

He was happy to oblige.

Quickly, Cardan rejoined Jude on the bed, inserting two fingers inside her and spreading her open, readying her for him. Jude moaned in pleasure as his fingertips brushed a certain spot inside her.

“You’re deliciously wet, Jude. I wonder how you came to become so utterly soaked. Was it this?” and he sucked the skin of her stomach into his mouth. “Or this?” and he scraped his nails across the place where her pelvis met her stomach. “Or perhaps it was the spanking I gave you earlier. Did my punishment make you wet, Jude? Be honest.”

“No, My Lord.”

Cardan slapped her thigh hard enough to make her yelp.

“Do I need to repeat the question?” he asked.

“Yes, My Lord, your punishment made me wet.”

It was the honest answer. By the end, she had wanted nothing more than for the punishment to end, and she felt thoroughly disciplined and repentant, but at the same time... she couldn’t deny that a part of her had enjoyed it, a part that, until a week ago, she would have viewed as sick and twisted.

“Good girl,” he said, and she got the same feeling of fulfillment as she had when he had said it earlier.

“Good little slut,” he added, and her inner walls clenched around his fingers. Cardan grinned.

When he was satisfied that she was thoroughly prepared for him, Cardan pushed into her slowly, filling her in a way she could only ever describe as perfection. As soon as he was fully sheathed inside her, he began to move, slowly at first but gradually quickening his pace. He reached up and grabbed a fistful of her hair, hanging over her blindfold and spread out on the bed.

Jude had never experienced anything like being fucked while so completely immobilized and unable to see. It was exquisite in its terror.

Cardan yanked her head backwards so that her chin pointed towards the ceiling as he fucked her hard and fast. He was rarely this rough with her, but she was enjoying every moment of it. In fact, as she cried out in pleasure, she thought her enjoyment could rise no higher, until he began to speak to her.

“Do you know how depraved you are, Jude? How utterly desperate you seem, becoming wet from my punishment? Do you like it when I cause you pain?” As he spoke, he brought a hand between them and circled her clit roughly. Her arousal grew and grew as he spoke, until she was thrashing and moaning on the bed beneath him.

“I wish the whole of Faerie could see you right now, could know how wet and desperate you are for me. It is delicious for all that it’s pathetic. You’re so weak, so useable and breakable.”

Cardan worried for a moment that he had gone too far in calling her weak and breakable, but it seemed he had found an area of weakness for Jude indeed, because every word from his mouth drove her arousal higher, made her more desperate to come.

“You need not ask permission before coming, Jude. You have it.”

And come she did, crying out his name and “My Lord” and some unintelligible nonsense. He followed soon after, spilling inside her. Moments later, he pulled out gently.

“I shall return in a moment,” he announced, before standing from the bed and leaving the room.

Leaving the room?

A million possibilities of where he could be going began spinning through Jude’s mind, still hazy from orgasm. She felt her panic rising as she imagined that someone would enter while he was gone, would see her like this - or worse, that he would deliberately bring someone back with him. Or what if he didn’t return for hours, days? What if he forgot that humans require bathroom visits? What if—

As her thoughts continued to spiral, Cardan returned, of course, but by this point Jude had worked herself up into a frenzy of panic and was panting and pulling at her bonds.

“Cardan? Is that you?” she asked, and he rushed to her side.

“Of course, Jude. What happened?”

Jude calmed slightly but her anxiety was far from alleviated.

“I... began to worry.”

Cardan cursed himself.

“I’m sorry, Jude. I shouldn’t have left you so soon after you came. I should’ve known that you would need a moment to recover before I walked out. But it is only me, and I returned, and I’ve brought nothing with which to cause you anything but pleasure.”

Jude had calmed by the time he ceased talking, and now felt entirely ridiculous.

“And,” Cardan continued, just as Jude opened her mouth to apologize. “If you apologize for panicking, I shall have no choice but to punish you again, which, given the current state of your behind, I doubt you would enjoy too thoroughly.”

Jude closed her mouth.

“Good girl,” he said, stroking her hair back from her face. “Now, tell me when you’re prepared for the fun I have in store.”

“I’m ready, My Lord,” she replied.

“Good. The only rule of this game we’re about to play is that you cannot move. Not even a twitch. Do you understand? You can make all the sound you want, but no motion, and you will be punished for each infraction.

Jude nearly groaned at the thought of more punishment, but caught herself, knowing that complaint would only elicit what she hoped to avoid.

However, she made it barely a moment before yelping and jerking in her bonds when the ice touched her thigh. The spot where it had touched was immediately assaulted with a stinging slap from Cardan’s hand.

“The rule is that you do not move, my Jude.”

Jude rolled her eyes where Cardan couldn’t see it, beneath her blindfold.

“Yes, My Lord,” was all she said.

To Jude’s credit, she managed to stay still when the ice touched her other thigh, even as Cardan moved it closer and closer to her most sensitive spots. She even remained still as it touched her breast, but the moment it landed directly on her nipple she jerked against the bonds.

Cardan’s second slap landed directly on her breast, a ring catching her nipple, and she cried out in surprise and pain.

“Jude, Jude, Jude,” Cardan said, “whatever shall I do with you? Most disobedient.”

Jude could hear the smirk in his voice and knew he had never intended for her to remain still during this exercise.

Jude moved only one more time, and that was when the ice directly pressed into her clit. She cried out and tried to squirm away but, rather than slapping her, Cardan merely pressed it more firmly against her.

He used the ice to circle her clit as he inserted two fingers inside her, pumping and curling, causing dual sensations of pleasure and pain when combined with the ice. Jude had no idea how to react, and so focused all efforts on remaining entirely still.

Cardan, impressed with her self control, inserted an ice cube into his mouth and brought it to her clit, tonguing it gently, making sure the ice-cold water trickled down his tongue and onto her.

When the ice melted and it was all Jude could do not to squirm away from the cold, Cardan finally relented and began trying to make Jude come in earnest, curling his fingers inside her and flicking his tongue against her clit. She came rapidly, more aroused than he had realized from the combination of ice and punishment.

When she did, he licked her through the orgasm, then moved from the bed to untie her and remove her blindfold. Once she was free from her bonds, he rubbed her arms and legs to ensure her circulation before settling down beside her and pulling her into his arms.

Jude, for her part, was utterly, entirely satisfied, and utterly, entirely exhausted. She wanted nothing more than to sleep, but Cardan had other plans.

“Talk with me, Jude.”

She groaned and he chuckled.

“I know you’re tired, but I need to know how you feel before I can allow you to sleep.”

Even better. Talking about her feelings.

“How do you feel physically?”

“Tired,” she said, and he pulled her hair lightly in warning.

“And?”

“My ass hurts. Badly. My arm is sore where she bruised it. My side hurts where it’s cut. Other than that, I feel... amazing. Satisfied. A little sticky. My Lord.”

Cardan laughed heartily at this.

“And mentally?”

“Exhausted. A little bit guilty for what I did, even if I know I shouldn’t, I’ve been absolved and all that.”

The language Jude used when talking with those in the mortal world, the more informal patterns of speech, began to come through in her exhaustion, much to Cardan’s delight.

“I also feel... a little confused. Not confused exactly, but like, all over the place? First I was in danger, then I was comforted, then I was punished, then I was... well, made to feel much better.”

“I’m not sure,” began Cardan, “that I made the correct choice today in going directly from punishment to play. In the future, I should think I will keep a serious punishment separate from pleasure. But we are both still learning, and I am no stranger to making mistakes.”

Jude nodded. “I certainly didn’t mind, though,” she added hurriedly, not wanting him to get the idea that her pleasure was too confusing for her.

“And emotionally? How do you feel?” He stroked her hair, knowing this question would be the hardest.

“Grateful,” came easily from her. “That you... care. Worried that you’ll stop caring, guilty that I’m letting you care.”

“And?”

“Lucky,” she whispered. “To have... whatever this is.”

Cardan smiled and kissed the top of her head.

“I feel the same.”

As Jude felt herself beginning to drift off to sleep, Cardan had one remaining question.

“Jude?”

“Yes, M’Lord?” she slurred sleepily.

“If I ever, ever hurt you in a way that is too much, or not what you want, or unwarranted, or... abusive, in any way, you’ll tell me?”

Jude could hear the insecurity in his voice and knew exactly where it came from, had been waiting, in fact, for this issue to arise.

“You aren’t your brother,” she whispered. “What he did to you was wrong. It was abuse. What you’re doing to me is consensual and what I desire. I promise that I will tell you if that ever changes, but for now, please remember that I want this, and that you didn’t.”

Cardan kissed her head, her forehead, her eyelids, and stroked a hand down her side.

“Thank you,” he said, “for remembering.”

It occurred to Jude, then, that Cardan had no idea she had seen his brother beat him, thought she remembered only from passing comments and the fact that he had listed it as a reason for hating her. She resolved to tell him eventually, but knew the conversation would be a difficult one, that it was something he had never, never wanted her to see, and decided that this conversation was for a different and far less sleepy time.

As Jude drifted off to sleep, she thought she heard Cardan whisper one last thing.

“Goodnight, Jude. My cure.”


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “You look so beautiful like this,” he said in a soothing voice, “clamped and spread for me. I could keep you like this forever.”
> 
> Alternate Summary: Toys toys toys!

Cardan was near trembling with barely-contained excitement and nerves. It was the first time Jude had ever allowed him to accompany her in visiting Vivi, Oak, and a newly-returned Heather in the mortal world, and he was both honored that she would allow him this privilege and excited about the plans he had made for his time there.

Jude had told Cardan the little she knew about BDSM from the movies and television shows of the mortal world, and he had surmised that arrangements there had quite a bit more to work with in the way of… items. His plan, unbeknownst to Jude, was to acquire some of these items during their time there, could he slip away.

When they arrived at Vivi’s apartment, Oak barreled out to greet them. He flung himself into Jude’s arms, excited to see her for the first time in a month. To Cardan’s surprise, Oak then hugged him, grinning ear to ear. He pulled away quickly, unsure how to react. He wasn’t used to receiving physical affection from anyone he was not sleeping with.

They entered the apartment, and Cardan soon realized that his “slipping away” was going to be far more akin to “making a blatant excuse and leaving.” He only hoped that he didn’t say anything that would make Jude angry or uncomfortable, that he wouldn’t let on the nature of the task he needed to complete.

“I need to… go somewhere,” was what he settled with, before bolting from the apartment a mere hour after arriving.

Jude, bewildered, watched him go.

“What was that about?” asked Heather.

“I have no idea,” Jude replied, though she had a sneaking suspicion as to the nature of an errand he would tell no one about. “He’s weird sometimes.”

“Yeah, you think?” asked Vivi.

The rest of the day progressed without incident. Jude revisited fish sticks, which Oak had taken a strong liking to as well. The four went to the mall while Cardan ran his mysterious errand, and Jude bought some new clothes to wear in the mortal world — along with a few things to wear for Cardan alone. These purchases, made in front of Vivi, were the first thing that clued Vivi in to the fact that there was any sort of relationship between Jude and Cardan.

“How could you not tell me?” she asked accusingly as they exited the store.

“We’re married, Vivi. And you already knew that we’d… done things.”

“Yeah, but last you told me you hated his guts! I thought you’d clue me in on that changing, at least.”

“Maybe I still hate his guts.”

Vivi only glared.

“Well, I for one am glad,” said Heather. “You deserve to be happy, Jude.”

It occurred to Jude that she was, in fact, happier than she had been in quite some time.

“Thanks, Heather,” she replied, with a sidelong glare at Vivi.

When the four returned home, Cardan was back, waiting in the living room with two medium-sized brown paper bags.

“We should probably get going,” Jude said when she saw the look he was giving her, his look of dominance. Command. “We have duties to attend to.”

“Of course,” said Vivi. “Well, I’ll see you soon, I hope?”

“Yeah! I want to visit more often.”

Hugs were exchanged all around, several of which included Cardan, to his discomfort. On the trip home, Jude inquired about it.

“Why were you so uncomfortable when they hugged you, My Lord?” She had seen the glint of power in his eyes and wanted to be cooperative now that they were alone and she didn’t risk exposing the nature of their relationship, if one could call it that.

“It is not something I’ve often had cause to experience,” he answered, voice quiet.

Both were silent for the remainder of the trip home. Jude was mulling over how she could help Cardan become more comfortable with platonic physical affection, and Cardan was wondering if Jude saw him as weak for being unable to tolerate it.

He resolved to simply remind her that weak, in fact, he was not.

The moment they stepped foot in Cardan’s bedchamber, he turned on Jude, pinning her in place with a look.

“Strip and kneel in the center of the room,” he ordered, leaving no room for hesitation. She immediately complied, slipping out of the clothes she had chosen for the mortal world — a tight t-shirt and skinny jeans, as well as a bra and panties — and moving to the middle of the room before dropping to her knees and bowing her head.

Cardan set down the paper bags he carried, opened them, and reached into one, removing an object. Jude looked up in an attempt to see what he had purchased.

“Head down,” he ordered, and she obeyed.

Moments later, she knew exactly what he held as he attached metal handcuffs around one of her wrists, pulled both arms behind her back, and affixed them to the other wrist.

“Test them.”

She did, pulling until he was satisfied that she would not be able to free herself. Then, he returned to the bags before drawing loose another object. Jude kept her head down, eyes averted, but heard a rustling that sounded like chain.

“Tell me if this is too painful. My intention is not to cause you undue pain, as you have been very obedient today.” With that, he attached a tweezer-esque clamp to one of her nipples. Jude couldn’t help the gasp that escaped her, but shook her head when he looked at her with concern in his eyes.

“It’s okay, My Lord. Not too painful.”

Cardan nodded, stroked her hair, and attached the other clamp.

“Very good, Jude,” he said, running a hand down her spine. She shivered under his touch and his praise.

One of the bags was positioned behind Jude, so she got not even a glimpse of what he pulled out next, and it made no sound. Even as she felt its stinging impact on her back and cried out in surprise, she had no idea what manner of item he held.

“Do you know what this is, Jude?”

“No, My Lord.”

“The kind woman at the store I visited today informed me that it’s called a riding crop, intended to provoke pleasure as much as pain. Spread your legs for me, dear Jude.”

Jude closed her eyes nervously as she did so, knowing what was coming. Sure enough, moments later she felt the sting of the crop on the inside of her thigh. Immediately after the blow landed, she cried out, feeling him tug on the chain connecting her nipples.

“I fear that by punishing you so soon into our arrangement, I gave you the impression that pain can be nothing _but_ punishing. But it can also be pleasurable, and that is my intention for the current session. Tell me if I harm you beyond what is pleasurable, do you understand?”

“Yes, My Lord.”

Jude _did_ find the crop and the clamps pleasurable, as was evident by the wetness between her thighs. Cardan circled her, alternating blows and tugs on the chain as he moved, eliciting delicious little cries and gasps from Jude.

When, at last, he tired of his motions, Jude was covered in small red marks, from the insides of her thighs to her breasts to her back. A few smacks had landed on her clamps directly, resulting in the fact that her nipples were slightly swollen, which made them, in Cardan’s eyes, all the more delightful.

Suddenly, to Jude’s surprise, Cardan removed the handcuffs.

“Stand,” he ordered, and Jude leaped up, rushing to obey.

_Good_ , thought Cardan, knowing that he needed her in exactly this state for what he was about to attempt.

“I need something from you, Jude.”

“Yes, My Lord?”

“Your trust.”

Jude was silent for a moment before responding quietly, “you have it.”

“Good. Kneel on the bed on your knees and elbows.”

Jude did as she was told.

“Spread your legs.”

She obeyed, wondering what more there could be to this than ordinary fucking, with the position he was putting her in.

She felt Cardan’s weight on the bed behind her before she felt his mouth on the small of her back, pressing gentle kisses there.

“What can I do to help you relax?” Cardan asked, before kissing lower, on the top of her ass.

“I am relaxed,” Jude said indignantly, before adding, “My Lord.”

“You’re never relaxed, Jude,” he said, voice flat.

Jude closed her eyes and breathed. “Why do I need to relax, My Lord?”

“I’m going to try something,” Cardan began. “Something new, and something that might make you uncomfortable or nervous. But if you trust me, I promise I can make it pleasurable for you.”

Jude gulped, already nervous. “Ok. I trust you, and I’ll try to relax.” She focused on relaxing her muscles slowly, breathing in and out in a steady rhythm.

Cardan stood from the bed and retrieved something else from his bags of mystery.

He ran his hands down her sides when he returned, around her hips and over the globes of her ass.

“You look so beautiful like this,” he said in a soothing voice, “clamped and spread for me. I could keep you like this forever.”

Jude felt herself grow wetter, and felt Cardan put a finger in her wetness, spreading it backward and up until she realized exactly, _exactly_ where this was going, and exactly what he had in mind.

“Cardan!” she exclaimed.

He decided to ignore that infraction for now, in favor of keeping her as relaxed as possible, and merely continued what he had been saying.

“I bet you wouldn’t even resist, would you, if I tried to keep you here forever? You’re so desperate that I could just smack you around a bit and you’d be begging for me.”

Aware of what he intended or not, Jude couldn’t help but moan and grow wetter at his words. She had decided to trust him, she rationed, so trust him she would.

He continued to use her wetness to lubricate her as he whispered sweet cruelties into her ear. When he stopped, she heard a faint pop before something slightly colder was pressed between the cheeks of her ass.

“Relax for me, Jude,” he murmured, and then one long finger covered in lubricant was working its way inside her and oh god, even that was enough to hurt, and she was afraid that his ultimate goal would be far worse.

When she tensed around him, he finally began to explain his plan.

“I am not going to fuck you here, Jude.”

She relaxed slightly at the words, but was unsure where he was going with this.

“I bought one of these. A plug.” He held something up before her, something metallic and curved. She could guess, from the flared base, its intended purpose, but did not understand why.

“I know where it goes, but what does it do?” she asked nervously.

“It brings you pleasure, or it should. I know from... personal experience that it can be a pleasurable sensation due to the nerves in the area alone. However, for you, it should also press on your inner walls and, in conjunction with another gift I purchased for you at the... what was it called... Adult Gift Store, cause you significant pleasure.”

Jude nodded and slowly, slowly, began to thrust back against his finger, encouraging him. After several minutes, Cardan added a second finger, again covered in copious amounts of lubricant, and gently began to scissor her open further.

His other hand Cardan brought below her and used to pull on the chains of her clamps. She gasped and he moved the hand down to her clit, rolling gentle circles around it with his fingertips.

“Relax for me,” he murmured again. “Trust me.”

Jude relaxed herself to the best of her ability, but knew she was still tight.

“I promise I’m trying,” she said softly.

“I know, my dear. We’ll get there.”

She relaxed further when she heard his pet name for her, closing her eyes and basking in the sensation which, while still painful, now held a hint of pleasure, especially in combination with his fingers on her clit.

“My Lord?” she asked tentatively.

“Yes?”

“I think your kindness relaxes me.”

Cardan chuckled, a quiet, hard thing. “Naturally, the one thing I am worst at would be the most effective in the situation.”

“You aren’t the worst at it. Not any more.”

Cardan stroked his free hand down Jude’s side.

“Since we began this arrangement, you’ve been more obedient than I thought was possible for you.”

Jude glared at the bed, not finding this at all relaxing so far.

“And it has been so exquisitely, exquisitely beautiful. You have been so beautiful, my dear, and I have had the honor of watching you bloom.”

As he spoke, he gradually, oh-so-slowly worked the tip of a third finger inside her.

“I can sense your joy in certain moments we share, and I know no greater bliss than the feeling that I have had part in bringing it about.”

“You are bringing it about right now, My Lord,” Jude said softly, “even while we engage in something I never thought I would do.”

Cardan removed his fingers gently, soaked the plug in lube, and began to ever so slowly slide it inside her.

“I am so proud of you, Jude. Relax, my dear girl, and let me show you how good I can make you feel. I can make you feel so good, Jude.” With one final wiggle of the plug, it slipped completely inside her, save for the flared base.

“Beautiful,” he said, running a hand over her ass. “Stunning,” and then, “I shall return in just a moment, Jude, and then the real fun shall begin. Do not move.”

Cardan left, and Jude could hear him enter the bathing chambers, assumed he was washing the lube off his hands. When he returned, he stopped to get yet another item from his bags.

“This item, Jude, I think you will especially love and especially hate.”

Without further preamble, he shoved inside her a silicone item, heard her gasp and clench around it as both of her holes were filled.

A part of the item went inside her, touching, she realized as soon as she shifted slightly, her g-spot directly. The other side of the item rested against her clit, forming a U of sorts in and out of her.

With the dual sensations of the plug and the other toy, she had never felt so wonderfully filled, so stimulated without anything even moving. She moaned in pleasure.

Then he turned it on.

Jude saw stars as what she now realized was a vibrator stimulated the most sensitive spots inside and outside of her, as well as the inner wall against which pushed the plug.

“Oh, Cardan— Oh, oh, My Lord,”

“I told you,” he murmured.

“Why would I ever hate this?”

“Because, sweet Jude, we’re going dancing.”

Jude was dead silent for several long moments as Cardan grinned down at her. Finally,

“You wouldn’t.”

He slapped her lightly over the plug and she cried out in pleasure. “Attitude. And I most certainly would.” With that, he jumped up from the bed and returned with the tiniest slips of fabric Jude had ever seen.

He lay them down on the bed and, without warning, pulled the nipple clamps from Jude’s body.

Jude let out a scream of pain as the blood rushed back to her nipples, and Cardan grinned at her.

“Put these on,” he ordered in his most commanding tone, picking up the clothes. “No complaints.”

Jude stood from the bed and promptly fell to her knees once more as the still-on vibrator and plug settled inside her, rubbing together across her inner walls deliciously.

Cardan laughed.

Jude stood and began to dress, making no complaints even as she blanched at the outfit he had picked for her. A red thong that he must have purchased in the mortal world and a black “dress” no longer than a tunic. Still, though, when she slipped into the short dress, it hugged all her curves in exactly the right way, and she thought that even if she felt humiliated, she would be assured of Cardan’s constant desire, returning some of her power to her.

When she finished dressing, she turned to him, bowing her head demurely. Cardan smiled in approval.

“You’re doing quite well, Jude,” he said softly. “Perhaps if you continue you will earn yourself a reward.”

Jude, who had been turned on beyond all reason for the past hour, grew closer to the edge at the prospect.

Cardan switched off the vibrator.

“But not yet.”

With that, he led her from the room. As they walked down the hall, Jude became increasingly self conscious, noting the way that faeries were staring at her, wide-eyed.

Cardan, sensing Jude’s anxiety, began to whisper in her ear.

“If you as much as suspect you may be close to coming, you are to tell me immediately, do you understand? The punishment for coming without permission will be severe and _immediate._ ”

Jude stilled in terror at the thought of being punished publicly, but Cardan grabbed her elbow and pulled her along.

They reached the throne room without further hesitation, and Jude began to grow used to the weights of the plug and vibrator inside her. That is, until Cardan pulled her into the center of the room and they began to dance.

A faerie dance was a lively creature, and Jude could feel with every bounce and spin the movement of the plug and vibrator, rubbing all of her most sensitive spots. She became increasingly aroused to the point that she turned to Cardan and needed to say only his name and look at him for him to know exactly what she meant.

He pulled her away from the dancing to lean against the wall.

Then, he switched on the vibrator.

Jude nearly cried out in pleasure but stopped herself at the last moment.

“My Lord, I’m going to come” she whispered. He turned off the vibrator.

They continued in this way for some time. Every time Jude grew close to orgasm, Cardan would switch off the remote, and every time she grew farther from it, the vibrator came back to life.

During an “off” spell, Jude, in an attempt to make it appear that they were doing anything other than what they were, turned to Cardan and asked him a question which had been in the back of her mind for the past half hour.

“Where did you learn to use a remote control?”

Cardan grinned at her.

“That was by far the most confusing question I asked for the woman at the Adult Gift Store.”

Jude couldn’t help but laugh. She noticed, with a bit of sadness, that more faeries stared in shock as she laughed with the King than had looked twice at her revealing outfit.

Eventually, Cardan switched on the remote and pulled Jude back into the dancing.

“This time,” he whispered in her ear as they twirled, “you have permission.”

Jude’s eyes widened. As much as she hated being teased, surely he wouldn’t make her come here, in the middle of all these people, while unable to stop dancing?

As it turned out, he would, and he did. When she finally came, her body trembled even as she continued leaping and spinning. It was all she could do not to moan, to call his name, as she came hard and fast.

To her relief, he turned the vibrator off shortly afterwards and pulled her away from the dancing.

“That was truly evil, My Lord,” she said when they were out of earshot of the dancers.

Still, though, Jude had felt something... different, as she had danced and he had complete control over her pleasure. She had felt the first true inklings of the headspace he had told her she would enter if they persisted long enough in this arrangement, as though as long as Cardan had control, all was right in the world.

She told him as much when they reached his chambers.

He didn’t respond directly, merely studied her for a moment before ordering, “strip, then kneel on the bed in the position you held before we left.”

She obeyed, peeling off her dress and thong and moving into position on her knees and elbows.

She expected him to remove the plug immediately, but he didn’t. Instead, he stood beside the bed and stroked up and down her back in soothing lines. She closed her eyes in pleasure.

“I want you to remain completely still.”

“Yes, My Lord,” she said, eager to please. She focused all her energy on remaining as still as possible as his hand moved to her stomach. He trailed light touches over the flesh there before removing the vibrator.

“Clean this,” he ordered, and inserted the vibrator into her mouth without further warning. She almost gagged, but held it back, not wanting to move.

He moved his hand to her clit and toyed with it, her nerves still overstimulated from coming during the dance.

“What do you want me to do, Jude?” he asked, removing the vibrator from her mouth.

“Fuck me, My Lord,” she said without hesitation.

“You have permission to come, but remain as still as possible and completely quiet. I desire to use your body without being distracted by your presence.”

Without further preamble he pushed inside her, still wet and spread from the vibrator.

He pounded into her hard, and it was all Jude could do not to cry out or move against him, especially with the added and unprecedented stimulation afforded her by the plug, but she performed admirably. With every moment that Cardan used her body, she slipped deeper and deeper into a space where nothing mattered but pleasing him, and it became easier and easier to obey his commands.

He moved his hand to her clit, rubbing it hard as he continued to fuck her from behind. When she came, she remained entirely still and quiet, save for the shaking of her legs, while he followed quickly groaning and calling her name.

When they finished, he lay down beside her and she waited in position dutifully.

“You can relax, Jude,” he panted out. She relaxed into bed and curled her body against his, head on his chest and leg over his waist, unprompted.

“That was amazing, my dear. When I gave the command to remain still and quiet, I never expected you to succeed. I am so, so impressed.”

Jude felt as though the room glowed with the light Cardan’s praise spread through her.

“May I speak, My Lord?”

“Of course, Jude.”

“Thank you, My Lord.”

Cardan kissed the crown of her head.

“Whenever you’re ready, you may get back on your knees and I will remove the plug.”

Jude hurried to obey, despite his allowance that she didn’t need to move until she was ready.

Cardan removed the plug with the same care with which he had inserted it and placed it aside for future cleaning.

“Lay down with me once more, Jude, and tell me how you are feeling,” he ordered once the plug was out.

“Physically, My Lord?”

“To start.”

“Spent. Exhausted. Satisfied. A little bit empty, now that nothing is inside me. Comfortable.”

“And mentally?

“Also exhausted. Today was long. A little bit floaty.”

“Floaty?”

“Floaty, My Lord.”

Cardan laughed.

“Alright, Jude. And emotionally?”

“Cared for. Appreciated. Important. Like I would do anything for you, and like I can trust you completely. A desire to please you. The desperation of knowing I can never do enough to make you happy. Pride that I was pleasing to you today.”

“You have entered the mental state I described on our first day, haven’t you, Jude?”

“Yes, My Lord.”

Cardan smiled. “Good girl.”

Jude felt her heart swelling, felt a terrible desperation to hold on to this feeling, this complete feeling of surrender, of being needed, wanted, free.

Gradually, though, as they lay in bed, the feeling did begin to fade. And with every centimeter that it faded, it was replaced by a terrible pit of guilt, shame, and most of all, fear.

The vulnerability, the utter obedience Jude had shown tonight was enough to send her spiraling into panic. She couldn’t tell Cardan how she was feeling, because she still didn’t want to disappoint him, and she knew that she only would.

Eventually, though, even that feeling faded.

“I don’t know if I can do this any more.” The words came tumbling out of her before she could stop them, laced with fear.

Cardan pulled away from her.

“Jude? What’s wrong?”

“How can I keep doing this? Do you see how weak it has made me? How trusting? How vulnerable? Even if you don’t hurt me, someone else will use this to. I can’t afford to let that happen, Cardan! I’m terrified. I want this, I do, but should I have it?”

“‘My Lord’, Jude,” he reminded her gently. He knew that if he let the rules slip away, so might she. “And yes, Jude, yes, you should have it. I think that you not only want this, but need it. Think of how you felt today, what you called a ‘floaty’ feeling. Think of how badly you needed that.” He stroked up and down her sides as he spoke, soothing her.

“I know it frightens you. The depth of my feeling about this arrangement frightens me as well. But you are not weak, and you deserve to feel something other than stress and misfortune. You deserve this, Jude. So take it. Don’t run away.”

Jude closed her eyes against the feelings welling up in her.

“It doesn’t make me weak, My Lord?” she asked, voice small.

“It doesn’t make you weak, Jude.” he replied.

“I’ll stay for now,” she murmured, “if you promise not to get angry with me for what I’m about to tell you.”

She had decided that now, while Cardan was desperate to convince her to maintain the arrangement, would be the best time to tell him what she had seen between him and Balekin.

“I will try my best,” he said, voice wary. “Is this something you expect punishment for?”

“No, My Lord. Merely something I want you to know, but which you might not be thrilled to hear.”

Cardan nodded for her to continue.

Deciding to jump straight to the point, she said, “I saw Balekin beat you.”

Cardan stilled completely before slowly removing his hands from her body.

“When.” It was more an order than a question.

“Over a year ago,” Jude said. “I snuck in. I hid. It’s a story for another time, but I wanted to tell you that I saw what he did, and even then, in the depth of my hatred for you, I knew it was unfair. You didn’t deserve it. I didn’t want to hide this from you any longer. Cardan—“

He held up a hand to stop her from speaking, and both were silent for several long minutes. Jude felt a terrible sense of anticipation for what he would say next, for whether he would throw her out or punish her or end the arrangement altogether.

To her surprise, he did none of those things, and instead buried his face in his hands.

“I want to be angry with you, Jude,” he spoke from between his fingers, “but I can’t. In honesty, a part of me is glad you saw what you did. That you, if no one else, observed the way he treated me and cared. That you were present with me for that, if only once, and even if I wasn’t aware of it.”

When he finally pulled his hands away from his face, Jude was shocked to see his face wet with tears, smudging the kohl around his eyes.

“He was the only one, the only one of all of them, with a modicum of interest in me,” he said, voice breaking, “and he only wanted to hurt me. He said it was to make me strong, but I know now that it wasn’t. He just wanted to exert his power over me, and I was desperate for even that form of attention.” He smiled bitterly. “How pathetic does that make me?”

“It makes you normal, Cardan. It means you have a heart, after all.” She smiled to let him know she was joking, and he gave a small smile back. “I wish I could go back in time and stop him,” she said, now serious. “I wish that someone better had loved you. Someone who…” she trailed off, thinking of how recent it was that she would ever consider saying what she was about to. “Someone who deserved you.”

Cardan closed his eyes against the tears that still spilled from them.

“Thank you,” he said, “for caring. For being the first to care.”

Jude pulled Cardan’s head onto her chest and he slung an arm over her stomach.

“Jude,” he said, “My biggest fear about this whole arrangement is making you feel the way Balekin made me feel. Making you feel as though I only want to hurt you, to exert my power. I never want a true punishment to feel unfair or for my benefit.”

Jude considered his words for a moment. “The difference, though, is that I have an out. I have words that can end the situation at any time. You had no choice — nowhere to go, and no one to turn to. I will never feel that, because even in your anger, I know I could turn to you, that you would stop and comfort me through whatever I was feeling. I trust you, Cardan. You will never make me feel that way.”

Cardan buried his head into Jude’s chest, stroked a hand down her side.

“Thank you,” he said passionately. “I hope you would let me comfort you through whatever you were feeling. I hope we can grow to that point.”

Jude felt her anxiety rising and closed her eyes against it. “I’m trying, Cardan.”

“I know,” he said, hurrying to reassure her that he hadn’t meant to apply pressure. “I didn’t mean to imply that you weren’t.”

Jude stroked his hair reassuringly and he pressed a soft kiss to her bare chest.

“I’ll stay. We’ll see where things go. The way I felt today… as vulnerable as it made me feel, I want to feel that again.”

“And I want you to.”

Cardan’s tears had stopped, but the two lay like that for quite some time, his head on her chest, her hands stroking his hair.

As they lay there, Jude considered all that they had discussed, and she felt something like hope blossom inside her.

She was still terrified by how badly, desperately, madly she wanted this, how much she needed to feel that Cardan could take control and let her be powerless, but that feeling was now accompanied by one of excited expectation for what would happen next, for how they could take this to the next level and make her feel freer than she ever had.

For the first time in a long time, Jude was excited for tomorrow.


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hey guys! I just wanted to say -- there's wax play and breath play in this chapter, and I don't go into too much detail about how to do those things safely. Trust that they are being done safely in the fic, and please, if you're ever going to engage in either of those types of play, do your research first -- they can be dangerous if not done safely! Thanks <3

One Sunday, Jude woke in her chambers with a start. She immediately reached for the knife under her pillow, expecting, as always, that whatever woke her up would likely make an attempt on her life.

“Murder really is your solution for every situation.”

Jude closed her eyes against the frustration welling up inside her.

“Cardan, you startled me. Startling me is a very dangerous pastime.”

Cardan merely laughed. “If you would share my chambers, dear girl, we wouldn’t have this problem.”

Jude rolled her eyes, eliciting a stern look from Cardan. She knew — they both knew — that sharing chambers was still a far-off prospect. That Jude was loathe to admit any intimacy beyond what came with the territory of their arrangement.

“This week, I thought we would try something different,” said Cardan with a smirk. “It came to me, last night, that this week, you should not.”

“Should not what?” asked Jude, apprehensive and still rubbing sleep from her eyes.

“Come.”

She was instantly and completely awake.

“Cardan—“ she began, but he held up a hand to stop her speech.

“There’s no point to begging,” he said, a wicked grin on his face. “It won’t make a difference.”

In truth, Cardan did not think Jude was ready to beg yet. She would, eventually, and when she did it would be beautiful, but for now she was still too deeply entrenched in a fear of vulnerability and perceived weakness. She would think, he knew, that begging was an ultimate show of powerlessness, and he was afraid succumbing to it would send her running.

Jude, for her part, would have been somewhat comfortable with the prospect of not orgasming for a week, had she not known what torment Cardan was certain to inflict on her during the week to come.

And inflict torment he did.

**Sunday Evening:**

Later that evening, Jude and Cardan were in Cardan’s chambers, going over paperwork and appeals from the people of Elfhame. Cardan had been responsible for over an hour at this point, and Jude was counting the minutes, waiting for him to get bored.

Suddenly, he threw down the papers and sighed.

Jude grinned. “One hour and seven minutes of focus from Cardan. Impressive.”

Cardan narrowed his eyes, but he was smiling. “Oh, I haven’t stopped focusing, I’ve simply decided to shift my focus to more worthy matters.”

He began to stalk towards her, and she took an involuntary step back, then cursed herself. She never stepped back from a threat, which was clearly what this was.

Cardan’s smile grew wider. “Afraid of me, are you, darling?”

Jude steeled herself. “Never,” she whispered.

“You should be,” he replied, voice light. “This next week will not be easy on you.”

Jude almost took another step back as Cardan reached her, his face a mere breath away from hers.

“Go get the blindfold, Jude,” he whispered, eyes flashing, daring her to challenge him.

She waited only a moment before complying. When she returned with the blindfold, he took it from her hands and fastened it tightly around her head.

“Take off your clothes,” came his next order, and Jude could not resist a snarky remark.

“You couldn’t have told me that _before_ blindfolding me?”

She knew a punishment was coming for her words, but didn’t expect the stinging slap across her face until it was too late to resist the urge to cry out.

Cardan laughed.

“You’re truly testing me today, Jude, do you know that?”

Jude nodded, then, before he had a chance to respond to _that_ infraction as well, said, “Yes, My Lord. I know.”

“And why is that, Jude? Do you _want_ me to punish you?”

Jude swallowed hard. “No, My Lord.”

Cardan grabbed her by the hair and yanked backward.

“Then behave,” he said roughly before releasing her. She stumbled slightly and he laughed again.

_You’re in quite a mood this evening_ , she wanted to say, but she held her tongue, not wanting to incur further punishment.

“Lay down on the bed,” he ordered. “Put your arms above you and spread your legs.”

Cardan laughed as Jude stumbled over to the bed, unable to see.

Jude gritted her teeth against the desire to say something snarky. Instead, she did as instructed, laying out on the bed and waiting.

Moments later, she was startled to hear him speak into her ear.

“Do _not_ move, do you understand me? If you move, I will have to tie you up, and I will not be pleased.”

“Yes, My Lord,” Jude breathed.

“Good. Then let us begin.”

Jude heard something that sounded like a match striking, but rationalized that surely it must be anything but, because he would never use fire on her. She had, after all, vetoed branding, which she assumed he had suggested merely as an example of a hard limit.

Several long moments of waiting later, though, her thigh felt as though it had been kissed by fire, and she cried out, jerking her legs together. When the feeling didn’t immediately dissipate, she realized what it was — wax. He had poured a drop of wax onto her thigh.

Suddenly, her head was yanked backwards as Cardan grabbed her by the hair once again.

“I thought I told you,” he said, punctuating his words with another yank, “not to move.”

“I’m sorry, My Lord.”

He didn’t release his grasp. “If I want your apologies, I will ask for them. Right now, what I want is for you to obey.”

Jude tried to nod, but Cardan’s grip on her hair made doing so impossible.

“Yes, My Lord,” she said instead. “I’ll obey.”

Cardan finally released his grasp on her hair, but didn’t say anything. She found that she missed his usual reassurance, his “good girl”s and hair stroking. At the same time, though, she could feel how wet she had already become from his strict dominance, and knew this was only the beginning.

When the next drop hit, Jude succeeded in remaining still, merely whimpering at the sting.

Drops came more quickly after that, falling on her thighs, her stomach, her chest. When one hit her nipple directly she jerked upward, immediately saying,

“No — I mean, I’m sorry, My Lord.”

“I told you,” he said, dribbling an entire line of wax down her chest, eliciting a cry from her, “that if I want your apologies, I will ask for them.”

“Yes, My Lord,” she said, pain evident in her voice.

Cardan smiled, though Jude could not see it.

At first, this had been an experiment — a test to see how she would react if he went into a mode of pure domination, leaving comfort and reassurance behind. Quickly he had seen how much more obedient she was when she was in this state, and soon after he noticed how wet she was growing, how desperate even without being touched. He resolved to try this far, far more often.

When the candle had burned down too far to be of much further use and Jude was covered in dots of wax, he spoke again.

“Remove the wax from your body.”

Jude opened her mouth to protest that she could not, in fact, accomplish that task with her eyes covered, but quickly closed it. She was not about to elicit further punishment.

So Jude set to work, peeling off pieces of wax. Cardan admired the red marks left marring her skin, so much darker in color than his own.

When he bored of watching her fumble for pieces of wax, he knelt between her legs and, without warning, licked up her folds, circling her clit with his tongue. Jude moaned at the sudden pleasure but, to her credit, remained still.

“Keep going,” he said against her. “I want it all off by the time I get bored of pleasuring you.”

He knew this was likely an impossible task, considering that she could not see, but he delighted in assigning Jude impossible tasks. After all, what better reason to punish her?

He swirled his tongue around her clit and entered her with two fingers, quickly curling them inside her. Jude moaned once more, hands speeding up on her skin, desperately trying to find all the wax. Cardan grinned and hummed against her clit, causing her to buck her hips, then slapped her thigh in punishment.

“So very disobedient, my Jude. Whatever shall I do with you?”

He knew that not letting her come for a week was punishment enough, but was enjoying her flinches of fear at the threat of punishment, punishment she wouldn’t even be able to see coming. He wished he could keep her blindfolded all the time.

When he felt her muscles tighten around his fingers, felt her grow close to the edge, he stopped.

“Are you done?” was all he said. Of course, she was not - wax drips remained on her hips, her upper chest, and splattered across her ribs.

“Tsk-tsk,” Cardan said, reaching a hand down to pinch her nipple hard. She groaned but remained still. “A slut who can’t even follow a simple order. Maybe you _do_ want to be punished.”

Jude shook her head frantically, and Cardan smiled once more before removing the blindfold.

“There. Now that I’ve made it easy for you, can you do something right?”

“Yes, My Lord,” was all Jude said before setting to the task at hand, peeling the rest of the wax from her body. He could see from the look in her eyes, the concentration and determination, the hurried way she peeled off the wax, that she was desperate to please him, and he decided to take pity on her. He reached down and stroked her hair gently, just once, but she leaned into the touch, her eyes fluttering closed. Cardan grinned. This was exactly where he wanted her.

“Stay desperate for me, my Jude,” he whispered when she finished, as he climbed into bed beside her to hold her for a few minutes before they were needed in the throne room. “It will make this week ever so much more enjoyable for the both of us.”

Jude merely curled against him as he opened his arms to her, pressed soft kisses against his chest. For once, she hoped that the wax marks would still be visible when they entered the throne room, that every faerie in Elfhame would know what their king did to their queen. What she enjoyed.

**Monday:**

The next day, Cardan’s mood was entirely different. Since they had woken that evening, he had been nothing but gentle with her, delivering praise and soft touches whenever he had the chance. By the time they retired from the throne room, she was putty under his hands, soft from his softness and desperate for him.

Cardan held her hand as they returned to his chambers. Jude hadn’t even made her usual attempt to return to her own, so desperate was she for more of his affection.

When they reached his bed chambers, he sat on the edge of the bed and pulled her in to stand between his legs. “Do you know how stunning you look tonight? How utterly gorgeous and entirely fuckable? How much I’ve wanted to kiss my way down the beautiful column of your spine all night?”

Jude’s breath faltered and she could feel her heart beating hard as she looked down at him. “I’d love nothing more,” she replied, “than to feel your lips on my spine, among other places.”

Cardan smiled.

“And you will,” he said softly. “But Jude, you are still forbidden from coming. Do you understand? No matter how desperate I make you, no matter how badly you want it, you are to tell me if you even get close.”

Jude bowed her head. “Yes, My Lord,” she said, despite her disappointment. She had thought for one hopeful moment that perhaps, just perhaps, in this mood Cardan would go back on his promise to make her wait a week. That perhaps he would allow her the release she so desperately craved.

Cardan stood, then, and turned her around to face away from him. Slowly, tenderly, he untied the laces on the back of her dress. He placed gentle kisses on her shoulders as he slid the sleeves from them and let the dress fall to the floor. Then, he set to work unfastening her bra, brought back from the mortal world, a task at which he still struggled slightly, having no experience outside of her. He managed it, but not without some grumbling.

“You shouldn’t wear one of these in the first place,” he said, voice gentle despite his irritation. “I love to see you as you are, and it only limits my access to you. Access I deserve.”

Jude felt goosebumps on her bare skin. “I’ve been wearing them for much of my life, My Lord. I feel comfortable in them.”

Cardan sighed. “Very well, Jude, but you are never to wear one when you are with me alone.” With that, he dropped the bra to the floor before sinking to his knees behind her and hooking his fingers into the waistband of her underwear.

“And you most certainly,” he said, with humor in his voice, “do not need _these_.”

Jude smiled. “You want me indecent, My Lord?”

“You’re already a most indecent girl, Jude. Think of the things you let me do to you. Would ceasing the use of underwear add so much indecency?” When Cardan finished speaking, Jude’s underwear was on the floor, and he slipped a finger inside her from his position on the floor.

He hummed in pleasure. “Always so wet for me, my darling. How my words arouse you.”

Jude shivered.

Cardan stood and turned her to face him. “Undress me,” he said, but his voice remained soft, for once requesting rather than demanding.

Jude complied, unfastening his belt and removing his breeches. She sunk to her knees to do so, and leaned forward to press a kiss to his length before he stopped her with a hand in her hair, still gentle but warning.

“Not yet, Jude,” he said. “Tonight I want to show you what you mean to me. What all of this means to me. Our arrangement, your submission. How grateful I am.”

Jude looked up at him and smiled softly before rising to her feet. She stripped him of his shirt and, when ordered, obediently lay on the bed on her back.

Cardan settled between her legs and, without further preamble, slipped inside her. Jude moaned at the sudden feeling of fullness, and Cardan began pressing soft kisses to her chest, her neck, her cheeks. As he thrust inside her, slowly but gaining in speed, he kissed down her arms and over her ribs.

“Jude,” he said, and for one brief, terrifying, electrifying moment, she was afraid he would tell her he loved her. But he didn’t, of course, merely continued, “remember not to come,” before resuming his kisses. Jude was shocked by the slight feeling of disappointment, and quickly pushed away the sensation, uncomfortable with its implications.

Without warning, Cardan gathered Jude in his arms and flipped them so that she was on top, riding him. They had done this before, but not since their arrangement began, and Jude was surprised she would be allowed even this modicum of control.

Cardan smiled. “I would warn you against getting the impression that you have power here. You have only the power I allow you, which means you have no power at all, wouldn’t you say?”

Jude nodded, humbled, and continued to ride him, twisting her hips in the way she knew he liked. Cardan moaned and reached up to trace a hand down the curve of her breasts, over her waist, her hips.

Jude was growing more and more frustrated by her lack of release, a release she knew was still far off. She lightly grazed her nails down Cardan’s chest, and he looked at her in warning and amusement.

“Venting your frustrations, my dear?” he asked, but his voice was warmer than it was sarcastic. “Think of the hardship you’ve overcome in your life. Surely you can make it one week without release.”

Jude glared, but it wasn’t effective, as she was smiling.

“I _can_ make it, My Lord, but I don’t _want_ to.”

She twisted her hips again and, just like that, Cardan was coming, spilling into her and crying out her name, digging his nails into her thighs lightly.

When he came down from the orgasm, Cardan pulled Jude tightly against his chest. She allowed the embrace and used the position to press soft kisses to his chest.

“You look so beautiful atop me,” he murmured against her neck, voice quiet, spent. “I could watch you ride me forever. In fact, I can think of nothing I would rather do.”

The feeling of anxiety returned to Jude, anxiety that he would tell her he loved her, but for once, in this moment, she couldn’t remember her usual host of reasons as to why that would be so terrible.

He didn’t, though, just held her in silence for several minutes before she finally puled away, as usual remembering her reservations about being held like this.

The only time, she realized with some discomfort, that she entirely forgot those reservations was when she was deeply in the headspace of submission, beyond caring about her pride, fear, shame.

She rolled onto her back, and Cardan propped himself up on an elbow to trace gentle patterns across her skin.

“Do you want to come, Jude?” he asked lazily.

“Yes, My Lord!” Her voice was enthusiastic, but faltered when she saw the smile on his face.

“Good,” he replied, bringing a hand up to stroke her cheek. “I want to keep you desperate. Beautifully, beautifully desperate, my Jude.”

**Tuesday:**

On Tuesday, Jude was the one in a mood.

She was beyond stressed as her queenly duties seemed to pile higher every day. She had been up half the day answering letters and appeals, signing documents, and responding to requests before finally falling asleep only to wake an hour later to messengers at the door. Everyone in Elfhame seemed to have a question, a request, a demand, and even with Cardan’s help it was all Jude could do not to crack under the pressure.

Pressure she had so enthusiastically taken on when given the slightest opportunity.

And, as Jude had few people in her life to talk to about her stress, much less to take it out on, Cardan had been filling both roles.

One moment, she would be venting to him, explaining all the ways their subjects were irking her, and the next she would be snapping at him.

Several hours into the evening, Jude barged into Cardan’s chambers and approached him with a piece of paper. “What is this?” she asked accusingly.

“A document, my dear wife?”

Jude glared. “Yes, Cardan, a document. A document which directly contradicts a verdict I decided on yesterday! Do you have to make my life infinitely harder than it already is? Would it have been so very, very difficult to consult me before making a decision? Must you ruin everything?” She was near yelling as she finished.

Cardan stood and took her face gently in his hands, causing her instantly to feel guilty for the way she had spoken to him. “Jude,” he said. “I believe you could use some stress relief.”

Jude’s heart leaped, worries momentarily forgotten. “Yes,” she said, “Yes, I could. And do you know, Cardan, the best way to relieve my stress? Perhaps the _only_ way?”

Cardan raised an eyebrow. “I believe I do, Jude, but do enlighten me as to what you’re thinking.”

“Letting me come.”

Cardan smirked. “So, allow me to get this straight. You enter my chambers,” he held up one long finger as he spoke and took a step towards her, “yell at me,” a second finger, and a second step. It was all Jude could do to hold her ground. “And call me by my name, rather than the title we have agreed on, several times.” A third finger, a third step, and Jude dropped her gaze to the floor, ashamed. “And then you have the audacity to request that I allow you to come, four days early.”

Jude said the only thing she could think of, which was, “I’m sorry, My Lord.”

“And yet,” he said, so close to her now that she could feel his hot breath on her face. “You do nothing to show it. You don’t drop to your knees before me, you don’t grovel, you make no attempt to make amends. No, Jude, I don’t think you’re sorry, but I do think I know exactly what will provide you with stress relief.”

With that, Cardan turned and walked to a chair which sat beside his bed. The chair was armless, red and velvet and indulgent — a kingly chair, and it was new. Jude noted its newness.

“I’m going to spank you, Jude,” he said, the calm in his voice only serving to irritate Jude further. “Walk to me.”

Jude walked to him, resigning herself to her fate, but could not resist one last act of defiance before she went over his lap. As she stood beside him, she muttered, “but do make it quick. I have business to attend to.” She looked pointedly at the paper Cardan had signed, the paper that undid her own work.

Cardan smiled at her insolence, a cruel, hard thing. “Oh, my dear, I most certainly will not.”

He reached up to pull her over his lap. She was wearing a deep blue tunic from Faerie and flimsy black leggings from the mortal world, having been too busy to coordinate her outfit, and as Cardan pulled the tunic higher he admired the fact that he could see the lines of her underwear through the thin fabric of the leggings.

As Jude settled over Cardan’s lap, she began to suspect he had purchased the armless chair, or at least had it moved into his chambers, for exactly this purpose.

Cardan began to stroke his hand lightly over Jude’s thighs, back, and ass.

“This is not a punishment, Jude,” he began, “not that you haven’t earned yourself one.” As he said this, he slapped her once, the feeling muted by her leggings and underwear. She felt no real pain, but shuddered under the impact.

“This is merely to relieve your stress.” He slapped her again after several seconds, then stopped to stroke her back once more. “And to show you that there are ways to calm you down _without_ letting you come.”

The slaps came only intermittently, to the point that Jude had time to recover from each and, due to the fabric between herself and Cardan’s hand, felt little sting. She began to grow suspicious that Cardan just wanted her over his lap — certainly, she could feel that he was enjoying it.

With that suspicion, she grew impatient, and with that impatience came insolence once more.

“Cardan,” she said, “are you going to hit me or just play with me? I do have better things to be doing, you know.”

“Why Jude,” he replied, and as he did he slowly began to slide her leggings down her legs to tangle around her ankles. “I thought you wanted to be played with.”

With that, his hand came down hard, and the feeling was far more intense with only the fabric of her underwear to mute it. Jude inhaled sharply and fell silent, knowing that she could only push him so far before he would truly punish her.

The slaps began to fall more regularly after that. After about 30, he pulled her underwear down to join her leggings around her ankles.

Slap! Slap! Slap! More and more hits fell and Jude became more and more convinced that she had gone too far with her last words.

Suddenly, Cardan stopped and went back to rubbing, stroking, tracing patterns on Jude’s reddening skin. She tried not to let herself grow too complacent — after all, the spanking surely wasn’t over.

Sure enough, after several long minutes, he began again. This went on for some time — about a minute of spanking followed by several of soothing. The entire time, Cardan didn’t speak again, and neither did Jude beyond the occasional “ow!” and groan when he hit a particularly sensitive area.

The pain grew steadily over time, so that it took nearly 20 minutes before Jude truly felt it. When she did, though, it was a constant burning that was barely soothed by his periodic stroking.

Finally, when he began again after a period of respite, she moaned.

“My Lord,” she said, voice pleading despite her continued unwillingness to beg. “I’ve learned my lesson.”

Cardan sighed. “I told you, Jude, that this isn’t a punishment. I am not trying to teach you anything beyond the fact that if you relax and let this happen, it will relieve some of your stress. We will not be done here until you learn that.”

Jude groaned and resigned herself to be in this position for quite some time. She tried to put the work she needed to do out of her mind — a fairly easy task, considering that every time she focused on a thought for more than a moment, she was jolted out of her focus by sharp slaps.

After 30 minutes, Jude was moaning steadily in pain, but she could no longer deny that it was working. She was barely thinking about all that she needed to do, now that she had acknowledged that nothing she said would end this experience any more quickly, and she was limp over Cardan’s lap, no longer even squirming under the blows.

After several more rounds of spanking and stroking, Cardan stopped and laid a hand on her back.

“Jude, my darling,” he said softly, leaning down to press a kiss to her red flesh. “Do you want me to stop?”

Jude hesitated for a moment, nearly unable to believe herself, before she replied, decisively, “no, My Lord.”

“Good girl.” He said it fiercely, proudly, and Jude basked in the praise.

He continued, then, and the cycle went on for the next fifteen minutes, until the spanking began to cross the line between relaxing pain and overwhelming pain and Jude’s cries became sharper.

Then, Cardan stopped, and he caressed Jude’s ass and back gently.

“I’m very proud of you, Jude.”

Jude closed her eyes and reached a hand up to grasp blindly for Cardan’s. He took it and squeezed gently.

“I’msorry,” Jude said in a rush.

“Dearest, I told you it wasn’t a punishment.”

“I know. I’m still sorry.”

Cardan squeezed her hand once more.

“All is forgiven.”

**Wednesday:**

Wednesday was harder.

Jude had spent the rest of Tuesday in a blur of calm and care and Cardan, and on Wednesday evening she still felt the de-stressing effects of the spanking she had received, and it positively haunted her.

She felt so disturbed, almost sickened by her own behavior, the things that helped her, the things that she allowed Cardan to do. She felt good and calm and disgusting and pathetic all at once. She hated herself for how much better being hit could make her feel.

Of course, she also resolved to tell Cardan none of this. For all that she hated herself, she appreciated his efforts to help her, and she didn’t want to make him feel as though she thought he was the disgusting or depraved one.

When she reached his chambers, Cardan was in a good mood, and Jude resolved to pretend that she was, as well.

“How are you feeling today, Jude?” he asked, as if he knew.

“Relaxed. Calmer than I was yesterday.”

Cardan was, of course, instantly aware from the tone of her voice and the way she averted her eyes as she spoke that something was wrong. However, if Jude wanted to pretend that everything was fine, he wouldn’t stop her. Yet.

“Join me in bed, dear Jude,” he said, as soon as she entered the room.

Obediently, Jude walked to the bed and climbed in beside him, stretching out on her side to face him.

“Kiss me,” he ordered, an attempt to keep things light until he could figure out what had gone wrong between the morning and the evening.

Jude kissed him, but she still seemed distant, reserved. She didn’t deepen the kiss, merely let him guide it, which normally would have been a good sign, but now…

“Did you enjoy your spanking yesterday?”

Cardan knew he had hit the mark when he saw the agony flash through her eyes, but she quickly covered it, schooling her face into a mask of emotionlessness.

“Of course, My Lord,” she replied, nearly robotic.

“Can you still feel it?”

“Yes.”

“Does that turn you on?”

Jude was silent for a moment.

“Yes,” she whispered, and he could see the self-hatred in her eyes.

“Take off your clothes, Jude.” Cardan’s mind was whirring, trying to figure out how he could get to the bottom of what was wrong without causing Jude to shut down or leave.

Jude stood and stripped obediently before climbing back into bed.

“Should I blindfold you, Jude? Should I tie you up and play with you? Whip you? Wouldn’t you like that?” He ran his hands down her sides, around her back. “Wouldn’t that turn you on, my—“

“Locke.” The word, the word to make Cardan stop, stunned even Jude as she spoke it, and Cardan paled as he realized that something was far more wrong than he had suspected.

“Darling,” he began, but Jude was already pushing herself from the bed.

“I should go. I should—“

“No, Jude,” he said, in the most commanding voice he could muster. “I told you that when you said that word, I would make sure you were okay before we continued. That is what I will do. Get back in bed.”

Reluctantly, Jude returned to the bed, lying down to face away from Cardan.

He placed a hand on her hip, stroked gentle circles on the skin there.

“You’re upset about yesterday.” It was more of a statement than a question, but Jude answered anyway.

“Yes,” she whispered.

“Did I hurt you too badly?”

“No, My Lord,” she murmured. “It wasn’t you.”

“Tell me, dearest,” he said, gently, coaxingly.

Jude swallowed hard.

“I’m ashamed,” she whispered, “so very ashamed of the way you make me feel. The things I enjoy. The things that help me. Something is wrong with me. I’m sick. Am I disgusting, Cardan? For liking these things?”

Cardan continued to trace soft patterns on her hip. “No, Jude,” he murmured. “No, my lovely queen. You could never be disgusting, nor are you sick. I proposed this arrangement because I knew it would help you, and I believe it has, am I wrong?”

“No, My Lord.”

“I did not think so. And why, if this helps you, if it makes you feel good, would it be wrong? Why would you have caused to be ashamed of an arrangement that hurts no one and helps the both of us?”

“It hurts me sometimes,” she muttered, and he chose to ignore her snark, although he was glad she felt up to impertinence.

“Jude, you have no cause for shame. No cause for hating yourself for something that improves your life and mine. I hope you can not only realize that, but convince yourself of its truth.”

Jude finally rolled to face him, took his hand in hers.

“I’m sorry I used my word,” she said, bringing his hand to her lips and kissing it gently.

“Never,” Cardan said, voice strict but gentle, “ _never_ apologize for that. The words are there for you to use them any time you need to. I want you always to feel comfortable saying them so that I know when I need to stop.”

Jude gave Cardan a tired smile. “Thank you.”

Cardan brought a hand up to run through her hair, loose and spread out on the bed.

“Always.”

**Thursday:**

On Thursday, Cardan was the one under stress. He had been procrastinating signing all of the documents Jude had delegated to him, and now was overwhelmed. Jude offered, repeatedly and with great fervor, to just do them all herself, but Cardan wanted to prove that he was no longer the lazy boy king Elfhame viewed him as. He wanted to prove that he was responsible, and that he would not let the burden of a kingdom rest on Jude’s shoulders alone.

Still — he had determined that his stress would not keep him from making Jude a little more desperate, especially as the week grew near to a close.

As soon as she entered his chambers, having been summoned by a messenger, Jude crossed to Cardan and leaned down to where he sat, kissing him thoroughly.

“Someone is in a good mood today, hmm?” he asked when she finally pulled away.

“ _Someone_ is ready for this week to be over,” she replied.

“Unfortunately, Jude, I still have two more days of torment in store for you. I need to finish these documents, because I plan to spend the entirety of tomorrow and of Saturday devoted to you entirely. For now, though, I want you on the bed, naked, legs spread wide for me so that I can see what I wish.”

Unhurried, Jude stripped herself of her clothes and spread out on the bed, spreading her legs before Cardan so that any time he turned from the desk he would see her.

“And now?”

He cocked an eyebrow.

“And now, My Lord?” she corrected, but her tone was dripping with sarcasm. Cardan frowned.

“I don’t have time to punish you right now, Jude, as much as you seem to want it. Do try to behave. And to answer your question, I want you to touch yourself, but you are utterly forbidden from coming. Do nothing more than tease.”

Jude ran her hands down her body, but found herself desperate to be disobedient, to distract Cardan. She knew she couldn’t come, because the punishment for that was sure to be more severe than she was prepared for, but surely she could do something to distract him.

As Jude began to touch herself, she played up her reactions, moaning loudly and writhing on the bed, for once uncaring about how she sounded. She had felt better about their arrangement since Cardan’s comfort the day before, and now she felt far less ashamed about the enjoyment she derived from it all.

“Jude,” Cardan said after a while of this. “You’re being quite distracting.”

Jude grinned up at him. “Oh, am I?”

Cardan raised an eyebrow. “You’re _trying_ to distract me, aren’t you?”

Jude’s smile didn’t falter. “I would never do such a thing.”

With that, Cardan rose from his chair and stalked over to her. Finally, she stopped smiling and swallowed hard in anticipation.

It was Cardan’s turn to smile.

“What have I said, _dear_ Jude, about lying?”

“That I shouldn’t?”

Cardan slapped her. The slap wasn’t hard at all, but it surprised her into gasping.

“My Lord,” she added, realizing why she was being punished.

Suddenly, Cardan walked away. When he returned to the side of a bewildered Jude, he held two lengths of rope.

Cardan made quick work of tying Jude’s hands to the bedpost before leaving once more and returning with something new, clearly purchased on his trip to the mortal sex shop. Attached to a handle were many long strips of leather, or something that looked like it. Jude thought that it looked painful and began to regret her efforts to get any sort of attention from Cardan, good or bad.

“Don’t try to turn away from me, or I’ll tie your legs as well,” was all he said before he slapped her in the stomach with the implement. It didn’t hurt nearly as much as she had anticipated, but as he continued to rain blows down on her stomach, thighs, and chest, she began to feel the sting. When the tip of one of the strands connected directly with her nipple, Jude cried out, and Cardan delivered a wicked grin.

“That’s what I want to hear,” he said. “Do you know why I’m flogging you, Jude?”

“Because I distracted you, My Lord.”

“That’s right. What _should_ I be doing right now?”

“Working, My Lord.”

“Another correct answer. Someone has realized the error of her ways.”

Jude kept her legs spread and didn’t twist away from the flogger, even when it took all of her willpower not to. Luckily, Jude had considerable willpower.

Finally, the blows ceased, and Cardan leaned down to press a kiss to the top of one of Jude’s breasts, the area which had gotten the worst of the flogging.

“Can I get back to work now, Jude?”

Jude, not really in pain but thoroughly chastised, lowered her head.

“Yes, My Lord. I’m sorry.”

Cardan didn’t believe for one second that she wasn’t happy to have gotten his attention, but he accepted the apology anyway, stroked her hair in approval.

“Good girl.”

**Friday:**

Friday was the final day before Jude was allowed to come, and she had never been so desperate. All she thought about was when, how, where he would touch her, and she went through the weeks since their arrangement had begun over and over in her mind, fueling her own fantasies, making her even more desperate.

Cardan had ordered her to report to his room the moment she awoke, and so she did, arriving shortly before the sun was supposed to set.

Cardan was sitting on the bed naked when she entered, legs spread and back against the wall, and he was reading. Jude took a moment to simply stare at him.

“Jude!” he said when he noticed her. “I’m glad you’re here. Come, won’t you join me in a state of undress?” He winked, and Jude was glad that he was in a good mood. Maybe it meant he would be lenient today, not be overly cruel in his continued torment.

Jude took off her clothes as instructed and joined him on the bed. She tried to sit beside him, but he pulled her closer until she sat between his spread legs, his book in front of her.

“I’m going to read, Jude. Keep your legs spread for me.”

Jude knew, in that moment, that there was very little chance of Cardan going easy on the torment on this last day before she was allowed to orgasm.

Indeed, as he read, Cardan did torment Jude. He would bring her right to the edge of coming, then stop to turn a page, stretch, run a hand through his hair. Jude had never been more aroused as when he stopped right as the words “I’m coming” were on her lips and instead played with her nipples, tugging and rolling them between his fingers. She almost came from that stimulation alone, but could not.

The whole time, he was silent, apparently intent on his book. Jude tried several times to read along with him, but found it impossible as all her focus was going towards keeping herself from begging him to let her come, or at least to stop torturing her.

After he had not touched her for about five minutes, his hand came down to rub the lightest circles imaginable around her clit. She couldn’t even imagine coming from this level of stimulation, which was the most frustrating part of all, and he kept it up minute after minute, nothing but the softest circles on her most sensitive area.

Jude’s head felt back against Cardan’s shoulder in frustration and arousal.

“Cardan,” she moaned. “I need…”

“I know what you need, Jude, and I know what you’re going to get.”

That effectively ended the conversation, and Jude simply allowed him to cause her further agony.

Suddenly, he stopped. “I tire of this. Up and on your knees.”

She hurried to obey, rising from the bed before dropping to her knees beside it. Cardan moved to stand before her.

“You know what to do, sweet Jude. But remember that I am in control.”

Jude took him into her mouth, swirling her tongue around him just once before she felt his hand in her hair.

“Stay still, Jude. Don’t move.”

She obeyed, confused, but understood as he began to thrust into her mouth. She nearly gagged, but stopped herself, wanting to be as good as she could for him. She had never felt so utterly used. It was as delightful as it was depraved.

“Jude — you’re incredible,” he groaned out, thrusting harder into her mouth and pulling hard on her hair.

Jude tried something new with her tongue, circling it around him as he withdrew, and he groaned in pleasure before withdrawing from her mouth completely.

“On the bed. Now.” His tone left no room for disobedience, so Jude stood and lay sideways across the bed, spreading her legs for him.

Cardan pushed inside her quickly and easily, considering how wet she still was from his teasing. Jude threw her head back in pleasure, unable to believe how good it felt to be fucked while this wanting.

“Don’t come,” he gritted out before starting to pound into her. By the time he came, Jude was so close to orgasm that she had begun to suspect she wouldn’t make it. She did, though, and lay in agonizing arousal while he rolled away to lay beside her.

Several minutes later, he took her hand lightly.

“One more day, darling.”

One more day.

**Saturday:**

The moment Jude woke up on Saturday, her plan was to rush to Cardan’s chambers and demand an orgasm. Unfortunately, things did not go according to Jude’s plan.

First, a messenger arrived at the door to announce that her presence was requested in a meeting. Jude groaned but dressed hurriedly and attended. Cardan was at the meeting as well, and she could see in his eyes how much he was enjoying the knowledge of her suffering.

It only made her wetter.

When the meeting ended hours later, Jude was informed that a pressing murder case needed to be brought before the King and Queen. She nearly groaned audibly, and Cardan only grinned, much to the dismay and confusion of the messenger informing them.

By the time they had heard the case, people were arriving in the throne room to drink and dance, and there was no easy escape for the king and queen — not that the king was trying particularly hard to leave.

Finally — _finally_ — Cardan stretched, yawned, and announced that he was retiring early and that he would be ever so grateful if his queen would join him.

Jude literally jumped from the throne in excitement.

As they walked back to Cardan’s chambers, he leaned in to whisper, “should I tease you tonight, dear Jude?”

Jude shook her head frantically, eyes pleading.

Cardan laughed.

“I’m joking, Jude. You’ve earned this.”

When they reached his chambers, Cardan lifted Jude at the waist and threw her backward onto the bed. Jude was still laughing when Cardan leaned over her, grinning, and began to divest her of the dress she was wearing. Jude sighed in pleasure and anticipation of what was to come.

When Cardan finished removing Jude’s clothes and chastising her once more for her choice to wear a bra, he moved his fingers immediately to her entrance and sank two inside her. She moaned and bucked against them, hopelessly desperate by now, and Cardan smiled softly down at her.

“I’ll make this good for you, Jude,” he said quietly. “Do you trust me?”

Jude didn’t know why she would need trust for this part of the week more than others, but she nodded, then said, “yes, My Lord. I trust you.”

“Good girl,” he said, before fucking her with his fingers in earnest, a thumb coming up to rub her clit.

It was not long at all before Jude was at the edge again, crying out, asking if she was allowed to come. Suddenly, she felt Cardan’s hand around her neck, squeezing tightly at its sides. Her eyes grew wide and she gasped for breath as she stared up at him.

“Come, Jude,” he ordered, and she did, hard and fast and seeing stars. It was the best orgasm she had ever experienced, almost too powerful, and she cried out in pleasure. When she came down from the orgasm and Cardan released her throat, she felt woozy, more from coming than from a lack of oxygen. She realized that he hadn’t really been blocking her ability to breathe, simply giving her the sensation of being choked.

Cardan didn’t stop when she came, merely gave her a moment of reprieve before beginning again, stroking her clit and curling his fingers inside her until she came again, this time moaning and whimpering, grasping Cardan’s hand with hers.

This time, Cardan stopped when she said “too much,” when the stimulation overwhelmed her, and moved to lay beside her, pulling her into his arms.

“Sweet, beautiful Jude. Are you satisfied?”

Jude, still breathing heavily, could feel every beat of her heart in her chest.

“Yes, My Lord. Yes, I’m satisfied. Thank you. Thank you.”

Cardan smiled down at her. “You’re welcome, darling.”

And Cardan, as he stared down into Jude’s beautiful brown eyes, had a terrible, wonderful, horrifying realization.

He loved her.


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Feelings Time

He didn’t tell her that he loved her then, of course.

There was too much left between them, too many untold truths and unaddressed hurts. Too many unknowns and too many things they had left to do.

At least, these were Cardan’s excuses to himself.

In reality, he was afraid.

For the past few days, Cardan had not seen Jude. She was visiting Vivi, Heather, and Oak, as she did more often since her time in exile. Vivi and Heather wanted the opportunity to go out, just the two of them, to relearn each other after Heather’s time away, so Jude went to play babysitter for Oak.

Cardan missed her. He missed having sex with her and he missed the rare moments afterward when he got to hold her. He missed looking at her and talking with her and raising his eyebrows when she was a bit too snarky for the confines of their arrangement.

When Jude returned from her visit to the mortal world, Cardan could hardly wait to see her. He expected her to come directly to his chambers upon her return, that she would have missed him at least to some degree, if not as much as he missed her.

But she didn’t come.

And she didn’t.

And she didn’t.

It wasn’t until two mornings after she was supposed to have returned that Cardan woke to find Jude kneeling in the center of his chambers, and he knew instantly from her posture that something was wrong.

“How long have you been there?” he asked sleepily.

“A while,” came her reply, spoken quietly. “I missed you.”

“And I you,” he said, rising from the bed and kneeling beside her on the floor. “Why didn’t you come sooner?”

“I was… I couldn’t…” she trailed off hopelessly.

“Come here, Jude,” he said, reaching out his arms to hold her. To Cardan’s surprise, Jude jerked away from him.

“I can’t!” she exclaimed, moving to sit across the room from him and bringing her knees up to her chest.

Cardan felt entirely helpless. He had several options – let her isolate herself, try to be comforting, or assume the dominant attitude he would normally take on to address the way she was acting.

He opted to give comfort one more try.

He approached her slowly, hands outstretched, wanted her to know he was only there to help. She shrunk even further into herself as he approached.

“Jude,” and he hated himself for the helplessness in his voice, for the way that he sounded like a child. “Talk to me, please. I want to help you.”

She was silent for several long moments before she spoke, and he could hear that she was close to tears.

“I need you to make me tell you,” she whispered, voice cracking. “I can’t do it on my own. It’s too hard. Help me.”

Cardan found that, for once, he had no desire to do as she asked. He didn’t want to make her tell him – he wanted her to volunteer the information, to trust him enough to open up to him.

(He wanted her to love him.)

Still, he decided to give her what she was asking for.

“Come here, Jude.”

She stayed where she was, knees pulled up to her chest, head buried in her hands.

“I gave you an order.” Cardan’s voice was entirely cold, pure dominance, what she seemed to be asking for and certainly needed.

Jude stood and crossed to Cardan, keeping her eyes on the floor.

“Bend over the bed,” came his next order, and she did as she was told, bending at the waist so that her doublet rode up.

“You can either tell me what the matter is, Jude,” he said, running a hand lightly over her thighs, her ass, her lower back, “or I can beat it out of you.”

Jude shivered, and from the way she rubbed her legs together almost imperceptibly, Cardan could guess the affect his words had on her. He was relieved that, at the very least, she was not too upset to be aroused by the idea of being punished.

Still, she didn’t speak. She lifted her ass higher, enticing him. Making him want to hurt her, if only for her cheekiness.

Maybe that was her intention.

His hand came down hard on the center of her ass, but she didn’t react. After fifteen blows of the same intensity with no reaction, Cardan paused.

“Jude,” he said, voice as gentle as he could make it, despite his harsh actions. “Just talk to me. Please, just talk to me.”

“I can’t,” came her response, choked and quiet. “I can’t yet. I need this, Cardan. Please.”

It was the “please” that broke him, the fact that, though it wasn’t quite begging, it was the closest she had ever come to pleading with him for anything.

He redoubled his efforts, yanking her pants down and raining down blows in earnest, only her underwear acting as a buffer. He viewed it as a success when she finally moaned in pain at an especially hard slap on the place where her thigh met her ass.

After a while, she was crying out softly at every blow, and he could feel warmth emanating from her skin.

“Are you ready to talk to me, Jude?” he asked, keeping his voice entirely dominant.

“Not yet. I’m sorry, My Lord. Not yet.”

He could hear that her voice was thick with unshed tears, and realized exactly what she needed.

He pulled down her underwear and entirely removed them, along with her pants, from her legs.

“Spread your legs for me.” She hurried to obey the command, spreading them as wide as she could.

“Stay right where you are. If you move so much as an inch in my absence, your punishment will be doubly harsh to what I already have planned. And believe me, darling, when I say that you do not want that.

He knew this harsh, dominating exterior was what she needed right now, so he fully adopted the role. As much as he wanted to take her into his arms and provide comfort for whatever was plaguing her, that could come later. Right now she needed him to coax the truth out of her, a task he would accomplish with pain.

He planned to make her cry.

When he returned, it was with a cane. He had acquired it more to use as a threat than an actual implement of punishment, but it seemed it would prove necessary.

He saw that she was exactly where he left her. Good.

“Jude, this is going to hurt. I won’t pretend that it will be pleasurable for you, but when you finally tell me what plagues you, your reward will be. Hold entirely still, do you understand me?”

“Yes, My Lord.” Cardan could finally hear a hint of trepidation in Jude’s voice, a modicum of fear. He was relieved to know she still had some sense of self-preservation.

With the first stripe of the cane, Jude cried out in pain and twisted her body to escape further blows. Cardan pinned her in place with a hand on her lower back.

“I told you,” he said, slapping her on the welts forming from the cane, “not to move.”

“Yes, My Lord.” He knew he had chosen the right implement from the way her voice cracked, the fact that she was closer now to crying than she had been even a moment before. He had hoped that one stripe with the cane would suffice to convince her to talk, but he was willing to go further if necessary.

At the second blow, she managed to hold still but wailed. At the third, she finally broke.

Tears rolled down Jude’s face when she looked up at him. “No more,” she whispered. “I’ll tell you.”

Cardan dropped the cane immediately and sat down on the bed beside her. Gratefully, she moved to kneel on the floor and rest her head on his lap, and he ran his hands through her hair, gentle, stroking movements to provide comfort after the pain.

“I’m sorry,” she began.

“That isn’t what I want from you, Jude,” Cardan replied, interrupting. “I want you to tell me what weighs so heavily that I had to make you cry to get it out of you.”

“Yes, My Lord. I just… it’s hard to tell you because I know that you’ll make me feel better when I do, and I don’t think I deserve to feel better.”

“Darling, you do deserve to feel better. You took your punishment for whatever has sparked this self hatred in you. Tell me, and let me assure you that you are not the monster you seem to think you are, undeserving of kindness and care. Tell me now, Jude.”

“I have been…” she paused, sighed, thought for a moment. “I have been haunted by the way I treat you. By the feeling that I use and take advantage of this arrangement and you get nothing out of it, and yet despite that, I still refuse to give myself over to you.” She let out a harsh, self-deprecating laugh. “I won’t even share your chambers on most nights, no matter how much of my time is spent here. And I am often unkind to you when you encourage me to be more open with you. Even today is an example of that.

“I don’t want to hurt you, but I cannot bring myself to be as intimate as we both would like. I have too much fear — fear that making myself vulnerable is the biggest mistake I could make. I am afraid, all the time, My Lord. And even telling you this scares me more than you know.”

Throughout Jude’s words, Cardan stroked her hair gently back from her face, ran his hands down her back and over her shoulders in a gesture of comfort.

“Jude,” he said after a long moment of silence, “you have done nothing which warranted even the punishment you received. I wish you had told me as soon as you arrived from the mortal world how you were feeling. I would have answered you point by point then, as I am about to do now.

“First, the implication that I get nothing out of this arrangement is absurd.” Cardan tugged on Jude’s shoulders until she rose, standing between his legs and facing him. He stroked her arms. “Do you know how much I crave the feeling of you beneath me, above me, on my lap or spread out on the bed? Do you know how beautiful you are and how honored I feel to be the one who sees you as I do? The idea that you gain more from this arrangement than I do is entirely ridiculous, and I will tell you that until you believe it. I gain more from this arrangement than I have ever gained from lying with another.

“Secondly, as much as I may press you to share my chambers and, more broadly, share yourself with me, I would never expect it of you. I understand that you need space and time and that you are unprepared to be that vulnerable. I will not deny that it hurts me at times, but it is not your responsibility to avoid that. As for being unkind to me, if you were truly unkind, I would punish you, would I not? Do we not have an entire system in place to avoid exactly that? You have no cause for concern.”

Cardan lay back on the bed and maneuvered Jude to lay beside him. “All of that being said, I am so proud that you shared with me how you were feeling, even if I had to cane it out of you. I know it was challenging. You will always be rewarded for doing difficult things. First, though, I want to know two things — how you feel now and what brought all of this up for you in the first place.”

Jude took a deep breath. “When I was in the mortal world, I spent a lot of time with Vivi and Heather, and they were… so in love, so affectionate and kind with one another, and it made me hate myself for the way I treat you. The way I _have_ treated you. Since we talked last week, I have felt much better about our arrangement not making me wrong or disgusting, but I still have doubts about the fact that this arrangement is all we have. We don’t love each other, we don’t take care of each other the way they do, and it makes me feel like I’m doing something wrong, like I’m hurting you. I don’t know.”

Cardan swallowed hard. He knew this was the time and yet he was petrified, so there was a long moment of silence before he finally worked up the nerve to speak.

“I do love you, Jude.”

There was more silence.

And more silence.

And more silence.

“What?” she asked, voice desperate, desperate to have misheard so she wouldn’t have to face the implications of his words and of what she had just said. _We don’t love each other_ , but if he did love her, what did that _make_ her?

“I love you. I know you do not return the feeling, and I no more expect you to than I expect you to share my chambers or share your heart with me. But I needed you to know that there is some semblance of normality in our relationship, and that is the fact that I love you. I love you, Jude, for all that you are and all that you can be. For all that you have done and all that you continue to do, every day, fighting for yourself, for me, for this kingdom. I love you for your bravery and strength and for your fear. I just…” he trailed off, unsure what else he could say that would truly convey the depth of his feeling. “I just wanted you to know that you are loved, even if it is by someone you never wanted to love you.”

For the second time in one day, Jude was in tears.

“I do — I do want you to love me. But I’m so afraid, Cardan.” She reached over, stroked his face, pushed back his hair and pressed a long kiss to his cheek. “I’m so afraid,” she whispered in his ear.

“I know,” he replied, taking her hand and bringing it to his lips. “I know.”

They merely held hands for several long moments. Jude blinked rapidly to clear her eyes of tears and Cardan gazed at her, wishing beyond all that she was his in more ways than sexually. Still, he would take what he could get.

Finally, he pressed her hand to the bed and rose. “Stay here,” he ordered. “I have a reward for you.”

When he returned, he carried a small box, which he held out to her. “For making yourself even the slightest bit vulnerable. For crying for me, and for telling me how you feel. For taking your caning so beautifully, and for being incredible for these past few weeks.”

Jude opened the box and found what looked almost like a choker. A tight leather necklace with a metal ring on the front.

A collar.

She looked up at him in surprise. “I… I’ll wear this?” she asked, hesitantly.

Cardan smiled.

“Yes, you will wear this. Only when we are alone, of course, but it will serve as a constant reminder that you belong to me. Perhaps you will incur fewer punishments with that reminder consistently available to you.

“I will expect you to don the collar and remove all other clothing every time you enter my chambers, as _soon_ as you enter. There will not be leniency for this new rule — you will be punished for every minute that you do not obey. Unless there are others present, I do not want to see you in clothes or without your collar. Do you understand?”

“Yes, My Lord,” Jude replied, slipping gladly back into her role.

“Good. Then obey.”

“Oh!” Jude hurried to do so, jumping up and stripping herself of her doublet and bra before lifting the collar.

“Wait,” said Cardan, holding up a hand to stop her. “Let me.”

He moved to stand behind her and took the collar from her hands. He pulled it around her neck and fastened it at the back, lifting her hair as he did. Then, he turned her in his arms.

“Beautiful,” he said, and kissed her so deeply she thought she might drown in it.

True, she was afraid, but she was also deliriously happy.

“Let me bring some cream for your welts,” Cardan said, after gazing down at her for several long moments.

“I have welts?” she asked, and there was something he didn’t recognize in her voice.

“Yes, from the cane. How does that make you feel?”

“Proud,” she said quietly. “Like I have further proof that I belong to you. And proof of what I can handle.”

Cardan smiled. “Good girl. You should feel proud.” He stroked her hair back and she pushed her face into his hand, content from the praise, the collar, and the tears she had shed.

While Cardan left to retrieve the cream, Jude lay on her stomach, anticipating his soothing ministrations. And when they came, it was all she could do to prevent herself from moaning at the mingled pain and pleasure of having cream rubbed on her sore ass.

“Now,” Cardan announced when he was finished. “Roll onto your back.”

Jude did as instructed, turning over to face him and smiling despite the pain, slightly hazy from the contentment she felt, from the headspace she had entered. She was right where Cardan wanted her.

“I want you to touch yourself, darling. I ask — no, I command — that you move slowly and pay close attention to every relevant part of your body before you come. I want to watch you put on a show for me. Touch yourself the way that I would touch you if I was unhurried, intending to draw our your pleasure. Make me want to come just from watching you.”

Jude, more obedient than ever after the emotional exhaustion of the last hour, complied immediately. She ran one hand slowly over her stomach, between her breasts, and up to her neck to trace the collar where it rested. Cardan sucked in a breath.

“So beautiful,” he murmured, voice worshipful. “You have no idea how stunning you look in the collar. In the evidence that you belong to me.”

Jude felt a warm glow of praise fill her body, and redoubled her efforts, hoping beyond hope to please him, to make him as happy as he could make her. She moved her hand up to suck her own fingers into her mouth before trailing them down, over her breast, leaving a trail of wetness in their wake.

“May I speak, My Lord?”

“Yes, Jude, feel free.”

“I’m imagining that it’s you touching me.” She closed her eyes, losing herself in the fantasy. “Your hands running over my breasts. I wish I could feel your mouth on me.” Jude was anxious, generally uncomfortable speaking openly about sex even while having it, but she knew it would overjoy Cardan to hear and all she could think of in this moment was pleasing him.

“If I was touching you, what do you think I would do?” Asked Cardan, encouraging her to speak further.

“You would press kisses all over my stomach. You always do spend so much time on it.” She ran her own hand over the soft curve of her stomach, pressing down to feel the hard muscles under her skin. “You would move lower, teasing me, making me think you were about to give me what I wanted, but then go back up to my breasts.” Her hands drifted over her thighs for only a moment before returning higher, circling a nipple lazily.

“What would I do to your breasts?” Cardan asked, and Jude could hear his breathlessness, the effect she was having on him.

“Bite down softly, then harder, then harder again until I cried out. Circle your fingers around my nipples but wait so, so long to quite touch them.” She couldn’t deny the effect the combination of her words and actions were having on her, as well, and her voice grew more desperate as she made herself wait the way she knew Cardan wanted.

“You would finally touch my nipples only to pinch them until I winced.” She performed the action on herself and let out a breath of pain. “And then you would laugh at me for wincing. You would tell me, ‘I thought that was what you wanted, for me to touch you there. Why are you protesting?’”

Cardan let out a breath. “You have no inkling of the difficulty I’m having in restraining myself from touching you, Jude.”

“So touch me,” Jude said, tone just shy of pleading.

“Unfortunately, I’m not done watching the show.”

Jude continued, only mildly frustrated by his refusal to touch her.

“Then, you would finally move down to my thighs and stay there.” She traced light circles on her inner thighs, moving slowly higher. “You would tease me, touching everywhere except where I wanted you to. Then, finally, you would hold my hips down,” she pushed her hips down into the bed, arching her back, and gasped at the pain on her ass, “and tell me to be still and quiet or you’d stop, and you’d touch me right here—“

“Stop.” Cardan’s tone left no room for argument, and Jude did as told, but let out a groan of displeasure.

“My turn,” Cardan said lightly, but his expression was anything but light as he moved to join Jude on the bed. Still naked from sleep, Cardan pulled Jude atop him, facing him, and entered her in one smooth thrust. Jude cried out, then shuddered in pain as Cardan’s hands brushed the welts on her ass.

“Oh, I’m sorry, darling,” he said, but she could tell from his smirk that it had been intentional.

Jude began to ride Cardan, moving up and down, forward and backward, twisting her hips in the way she knew he loved. Occasionally, he would grip her at the waist and still her motions, wanting her to simply feel the length of him inside her. In those times, Jude would moan at the deep fullness, throwing her head back and closing her eyes.

It took Cardan’s breath away. _She_ took Cardan’s breath away.

Cardan reached a hand between them and began rubbing hard circles around Jude’s clit until she came, fast and loud and beautiful, and he quickly followed.

In the moments afterward, after Jude rolled off and Cardan shifted onto his side to gaze at her, after Cardan reached out a hand to stroke Jude’s hair from her face, they felt as though nothing could ever go wrong.

“That… you touching yourself, telling me what I would do to you… that was beyond words, my love.”

Jude smiled at the new term of endearment.

“Cardan,” she began, swallowing hard. “Thank you. For that. For all of this. For initiating this arrangement. For telling me you love me. For making me trust you. It’s so hard, it’s all so hard, but this is the safest thing I have ever experienced. I feel safe with you. I’m sorry I can’t give you more than that.”

He knew what she was alluding to — she was sorry that she couldn’t love him. In this moment, though, he barely cared. What she was giving him was enough. Her trust, her safety, was enough for him.

It had to be.


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Do what you will, and I’ll let you. Make yourself feel better with me.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TW for discussion of sexual assault in this chapter! read with caution and take care of yourself.

Jude could sense Cardan’s mood from the moment he walked into his chambers. Expecting him back from a meeting which she had not been _invited_ to _attend_ at any moment, she was spread out on the bed awaiting him. If it was a way of drowning out her jealousy that the council took him somewhat seriously while viewing her as a mortal playing queen, she would never let on.

When Cardan arrived, however, he barely spared her a glance before slamming a pile of papers down on the desk.

“I find myself in quite a mood, and not one suited to this.” He gestured to her state of half-undress and her position on the bed.

He knew he was being unkind, but in this moment, could not bring himself to care. He vaguely expected Jude to storm out in anger, which caused him all the more surprise when she replied,

“Any mood can be suited to _this._ Take it out on me.”

Cardan turned slowly to face her fully for the first time since entering the room. “What?”

“You’re clearly in a foul mood. I don’t know what happened in your meeting, and you don’t have to tell me, but take it out on me. You might feel better.”

“You _want_ me to be cruel?”

“Yes. Well, no, not with your words. Hurt me. Use me.” Her voice lowered in shame at what she was proposing. “Do what you will, and I’ll let you. Make yourself feel better with me.”

Cardan looked Jude up and down slowly and began to stalk towards the bed.

“Get up,” he ordered, and she obeyed, jumping quickly from the bed and backing against the wall, nervous despite the fact that this had been her own idea.

When Cardan reached the wall, he pinned Jude’s hands above her head roughly with one of his own. She wore a long t-shirt from the mortal world and underwear, and he used his other hand to rip both articles of clothing from her in hard yanks. Jude gasped and looked as though she might protest, but stopped herself.

“Do you want this, Jude?” he asked, voice rough. “Do you want me to hurt you? To use you?”

“Yes, My Lord,” was all she said, an attempt to encourage him further, to let him know she was serious.

“I have been gentle with you so far, but if we move forward with this, right now, I will not be quite so kind.” Jude raised an eyebrow at the idea that he had been gentle so far, that the spankings and teasings and pain had been a kindness, but she said nothing. She could sense in Cardan a barely restrained energy, that every aspect of his being was working to keep him from doing exactly as she asked until he was certain it was what she truly wanted.

She decided to provoke him further.

“I want it, My Lord, unless you are incapable of being as rough as you would have be believe. Unless this,” she inclined her head toward her hands pinned above her, “is all for show. Unless—“

He cut her off with a hard, bruising kiss. Her ripped clothing lay discarded on the floor beneath her.

Jude arched her back into the kiss, pressing her now-bare nipples against Cardan’s clothed chest. He growled into her mouth and moved his free hand to her breast, taking a nipple between his forefinger and thumb and pinching cruelly. Jude gasped and let out a pained sound, and Cardan pulled back and slapped her across the face, not hard enough to mark but hard enough to make his displeasure known.

“Be quiet. If I hear a sound from you other than ‘Yes, My Lord’ and ‘No, My Lord’ I will ensure you cannot speak at all.” With that, Cardan resumed the kiss, but ceased his painful ministrations on her nipple to instead bring his hand to wrap around her neck. He squeezed the sides in such a way that she could breathe if needed but felt as though her air supply was being cut off, and Jude squirmed in discomfort and protest.

“You wanted this,” Cardan said between gritted teeth, mouth still against Jude’s. “You all but _begged_ for this _,_ and now you’re going to take it like a good girl.”

Jude swallowed back a whimper of... fear? Arousal? She wasn’t sure. For all that they’d done, he had never been like _this,_ and she was unsure how to feel.

At least, she was unsure until one slender finger pushed inside her, and then she was lost to the sensation and realized just how wet she had grown from his domineering actions.

He pushed hard on her wrists, a silent order to keep them there or face consequences, before moving the hand that held them down to her throat. He squeezed harder and harder as he thrust his fingers inside her, and every time his grip loosened she gasped for air.

Suddenly, his hand left her throat. Before Jude could prepare herself for what he had in store next, she felt his long nails raking down the sensitive skin of her chest, surely drawing blood, and cried out in shock and pain.

“Tsk-tsk,” said Cardan. “You’ve left me no choice.”

Then, suddenly, he was gone, walking away and giving her space and letting her breathe again. She looked down and, sure enough, her chest was marked with four bloody lines. She closed her eyes and basked in a combination of fear about what he would come back with and pride about what she could take.

When he returned, it was with what Jude knew to be some sort of gag, a ball with a strap running through it. In her pain, she had forgotten his order not to make a sound.

Cardan tangled his fingers in Jude’s hair and yanked her head away from the wall. He used his other hand to insert the ball section of the gag into her mouth, then fastened the strap behind her head. Jude couldn’t help but notice that as rough as he was being with her, he still took care not to clip her hair in the buckle, and she appreciated the reminder that he still cared, regardless of whether his harsher actions showed it.

Suddenly, Cardan spun Jude around and, with a deft hand on her back, shoved her forward onto the bed. She cried out through the gag, more in surprise than anything else, and Cardan laughed harshly.

“Quiet,” was all he said, and he landed a stinging slap to her ass where it hung over the edge of the bed. Jude tried to roll onto her back, but Cardan held her down.

“On your knees,” he ordered, and she obeyed, knowing that with the mood he was in, it was much safer to merely do as he said. She lifted herself to her knees, leaving her elbows and head on the bed.

Jude heard Cardan undressing behind her. Without warning, one of his hands came back around her throat at the same moment that 2 of his fingers entered her, opening her up to accommodate him. Jude moaned through the gag and thrust back against his fingers. He slapped her thigh, more warning than painful.

“Stay still,” he ordered. He removed his fingers and entered her in one fluid motion, keeping a hand around her throat in warning.

Cardan’s thrusts were slow, measured, teasing. Jude had expected him to pound into her hard and fast, bruising, rough, but apparently the way he had decided to take his anger out on her was through the torment of a slow fuck. Jude made as much sound as she could through the gag, trying to taunt him into fucking her harder, trying to make him angry, but he merely laughed and continued his slow pace.

After some time of this, Cardan thrusting slowly into Jude, Jude making as much sound as she could, and Cardan slapping her any time she moved, he stopped. He pulled out and flipped her over smoothly before coming up to lay in bed beside her.

“You can make as much noise as you’d like through the gag, darling, and it won’t hurry my actions.”

With that, he reached between her legs and began to rub slow, delicate circles around her clit. He used her wetness to make his fingers slip across her, ensuring that the amount of stimulation she received was far, far from enough to allow her to orgasm.

Jude tried once to grind herself against Cardan’s fingers, but the slap that he landed in just such a spot that his finger hit her clit directly was enough to dissuade her from further movement. Instead she remained still, moaning and squeezing her eyes tightly closed as Cardan teased her relentlessly.

After several minutes — which felt to Jude like an hour — Cardan flipped her back onto her hands and knees and began to fuck her once again. This time, he varied his speed, sometimes fast and sometimes slow, never giving her enough to reach anything near coming. He alternated these periods of torturous fucking with periods of slowly rubbing her clit until Jude was near tears from the sheer desperation she felt. Every time she looked at Cardan, he was smiling.

When Cardan finally came, he lost enough control that Jude thought she would be able to come from the stimulation of his quick thrusts inside her, but he hurriedly regained his composure and pulled out of her. Jude cried out through the gag, desperate beyond words, even if she had been able to speak them.

And when Cardan flipped her onto her back once more, Jude cried out something that sounded just enough like the word “please” to give Cardan pause.

He removed the gag gently, traced his hand around Jude’s lips to ensure there was no broken skin or chafing, but Jude was too far gone even to appreciate this moment of kindness.

“Please,” she said, finally relenting to the overwhelming desire to _beg_. “Please, My Lord, please let me come. Please, I’m so desperate, I can’t wait any longer. Please, Cardan, My Lord, please.”

Had Cardan had any conception of what Christmas was, he would have felt that this was it.

“Of course, my dear. You had only to ask nicely.”

With that, Cardan knelt between Jude’s legs and flicked his tongue against her clit until she came, screaming and with her hands tangled in his hair, hips bucking against him. All of this he allowed as reward for her begging. After she came, he gave her a moment of respite before starting again, and then again, until finally she told him it was too much, too much, and that he had to stop.

This time, he did as she wanted, stopping when she had enough, and moved to the head of the bed to hold her.

“Jude, Jude, Jude,” he chanted as he stroked her hair. Coming down from her orgasms, some of the most intense Jude had ever experienced, she felt like she was floating, like all was right in the world.

“Jude,” Cardan began, “my pride in you at this moment knows no bounds. There is so much more we can do, so many more doors which open for us, every time you submit further to me. I love you, Jude, I do.”

Jude was silent for a long moment as she slowly reentered reality. Then she said, voice soft, “I feel it. I feel that from you, always. Even when you’re harsh with me, I feel it.”

They talked and rested together for hours afterward, drifting in and out of sleep in a happily exhausted haze. Cardan told Jude of his frustrating meeting, and Jude asked what she could do to help him with the next one. Cardan merely grinned, which Jude took to mean that she would find out soon enough.

After a brief but much-needed nap, Jude awoke to the feeling of Cardan’s hands stroking up and down her sides and his breath against her ear.

“Wake up, Jude, dear. It’s nearly time to go.”

“Go where?” she asked, sleep still heavy in her voice.

“To my meeting.”

Jude sat up. “I’m coming with you?”

She could barely restrain the child-like excitement in her voice. She had been excluded from so many meetings since becoming queen, despite Cardan’s best efforts to ensure she was involved. In fact, the only reason he would ever attend a meeting without her was when they involved groups hesitant to submit to his rule, groups that would certainly be alienated by a meeting with a human queen. Even those meetings he had tried to bring her to attend, but she had insisted that it wasn’t worth the cost, that ruling a kingdom meant making sacrifices.

But she was damn tired of making those sacrifices.

Cardan looked at her sadly.

“I fear that you may not want to _attend_ the meeting, per se, but I have found a way for you to _observe_ it.”

Jude was confused. “How?”

Cardan merely smirked. “Patience, my dear. All shall be revealed to you soon enough.”

—

This was how Jude found herself several minutes later in an empty meeting room.

“When does the meeting start?” she asked.

“Oh, not for another hour, give or take.”

Jude’s suspicion grew.

“So why are we here?”

Cardan grinned. “To prepare.”

With that, he grasped Jude’s wrist and led her into a small closet off the meeting room where furnishings and supplies were stored.

One wall of the closet was bare, with only a bar at the top for the hanging of linens. At once, Jude realized what was happening. She tried not to let her anxiety show.

“This is quite a convenient location,” she pointed out. Cardan grinned.

“I chose the meeting room with exactly this purpose in mind.”

Jude swallowed hard and resolved once again to trust Cardan.

“You see, Jude,” he began, and as he spoke he lifted her wrist to the bar, measuring the distance, “I anticipate that this meeting will be near as frustrating as the last, and I want to waste no time afterward before taking what I need from you.”

Jude raised an eyebrow. “And how do you know what you’ll need?”

Cardan slowly unzipped Jude’s dress. “I couldn’t possibly know. That is precisely why I want you ready for anything.”

He peeled the dress from her shoulders and dropped it to the floor. Jude painstakingly resisted the urge to cover herself.

Cardan continued to undress Jude, next removing her undergarments and taking down her hair from where she had quickly braided it before leaving.

“Beautiful,” he murmured when he finished, eyes grazing up and down her body. In that moment, Jude nearly felt it.

“Raise your arms, dearest,” Cardan ordered gently, and Jude complied, closing her hands around the bar above her.

Cardan removed his belt, looped it around her wrists, and bound them to the bar. It was then that Jude realized there was a small slit in the door, small enough that no one would be able to see her, especially without knowing she was there, but large enough that she would be able to hear and somewhat see the meeting.

Jude shuddered and Cardan grinned wickedly. “It will be almost as though you are joining us,” he said, “but far more pleasurable for me than the monotony of meeting.”

With that, he closed the closet door, leaving her tied and in near darkness. For a moment, Jude thought she was going to panic — not because of her current predicament, but because of memories, memories of the undersea and darkness and cold. As though on queue, a small yellow flower grew from the floor of the closet and emitted a dull light, providing slight illumination of the space and grounding Jude. She was here, on land, under Cardan’s care. She was safe, or as safe as she could ever be. He was showing her that.

Cardan sat at a table, pretending to review some documents, but he glanced at the slit in the closet and grinned every few minutes until the first of those joining him for the meeting arrived. When they did, he ignored the closet entirely, focusing on the task at hand. Jude was impressed by his composure — he held himself much more regally in meetings than he often had in the past.

He was, of course, trying to impress her.

Jude felt herself growing wetter and wetter as the meeting continued, as she thought about her own situation and what would come next. The waiting was cruel and delicious. The closet was perfect — she could see and hear and feel scandalous without being in any danger of discovery.

By the time the meeting ended, Jude was desperate, beginning to rub her legs together out of hope for any slight stimulation.

Cardan waited several minutes after everyone had left the chamber before slowly, far too slowly, putting aside his papers and approaching the closet.

It was all Jude could do not to moan the second he opened the door.

“The meeting went better than expected,” Cardan said conversationally, as though they were simply having tea. “Perhaps you are my lucky charm.”

With that, Cardan began kissing a path down Jude’s neck, over her chest. He was gentler than Jude had anticipated, but she supposed that this, not a rough fuck, was what he needed after a meeting gone well. A celebration of success.

Cardan’s words, “you are my lucky charm,” echoed in Jude’s mind as surely as his “I love you”s had — after all, the sentiment was the same.

Despite the celebratory nature of their sex, Cardan made no motions to untie Jude from the closet. Instead, he relished her position of vulnerability, the way her arms were stretched taut above her, the way her body was on display. He resolved to have her in this position again as soon as possible.

Cardan traced his hands down Jude’s sides, a feather-light touch, and this time she did moan, a soft, pleading thing. Cardan rewarded her moan with a soft smile and a light pinch to one nipple.

“Good girl,” he murmured, and she melted.

Jude could never have seen this coming.

Could never have predicted the way she would feel under Cardan’s commanding ministrations. Could never have thought the lack of control would even be something she wanted.

But damn, did she want it.

When Cardan teased her, it was a celebration. When he finally entered her, pushed up against the wall and still with her arms stretched out above her, it was a reward. For letting him put her outside her comfort zone. For being _good_ for him.

Jude thought she might die of happiness.

It was something about the overwhelming sensation of being in a public place, of being rewarded, of being good and loved and fucked and cared for. It put Jude in a state of submission and peace she had not known in so long.

It made her want to be with Cardan in ways that counted, in her mind, even more than sexually. To share herself with him. To let him know her.

This was a dangerous feeling, Jude thought, but she could not bring herself to care.

When Cardan finally untied her, she barely noticed the soreness in her arms. All she felt was him, him, him. There was no shame.

Yet.

—

It was all Jude could do to walk back to Cardan’s chambers without stopping every few seconds to admire him, to stroke a hand down his arm, to thank him. She couldn’t seem to stop thanking him. There was amusement in his eyes, that much she could recognize, but there was also so much tenderness.

When they reached Cardan’s chambers, he led Jude straight to bed and helped her lie down before joining her. He pulled her into his chest.

“You did so well, Jude. So, so well for me. You have nothing to thank me for — you are the one who has given me a gift. You’re mine, and I am so lucky to have you.”

Jude swelled with pride until she thought she would burst.

As Cardan continued to murmur sweet words into Jude’s ears, however, guilt began to grow in Jude like a seed. There was a secret she hadn’t even realized she had been keeping from him, a secret she had forced herself to forget, brought back into her mind by the combination of vulnerability and hearing that she was Cardan’s, that she wasn’t her own.

All at once, it hit her, and tears welled in her eyes before she could stop them. Cardan was instantly alert.

“Jude? Are you - is this like before? When your floaty feeling turned into shame? Do you feel ashamed?”

Jude took a moment to try to collect herself before replying, but even that felt impossible. She was drowning.

“No, no, no,” she gasped out. “I just - I’ve been keeping something from you.”

“Something you did?”

There was a horrible silence before Jude replied, in the softest voice Cardan had ever heard from her, “something that was done to me.”

Now Cardan was the one drowning, for there were only a few things he could imagine that would bring Jude Duarte to tears, and none of them were things he thought he could live through hearing.

And yet, he had to.

“Tell me,” he said, voice breaking with the gentleness he tried to put into it. “Tell me, and I’ll be here. Tell me, and you won’t be alone.”

Jude closed her eyes and began.

“It’s not like I forgot, exactly. It’s like I always knew, some part of me, what had happened, but I never thought… I never thought, until now, that it was important. It never occurred to me that it mattered, that it was anything more than faerie cruelty, although the second I remembered it, _truly_ remembered it, I knew that of course it was different. It was in my mind and not in my mind all at once. Cardan…” and here Jude faltered, looking at him to assess whether he could truly handle what she was about to tell him. Cardan looked as concerned as ever, but his concern was for Jude, and he stroked her back reassuringly.

“Cardan, I’m sorry,” she said, and the tears began again, “but Balekin did something to me.”

Cardan felt something inside him crack. His hand stilled on Jude’s back.

“What did he do?” he asked, and felt as though the voice hadn’t come from him, as though maybe he hadn’t spoken at all.

Jude sobbed once, then steeled herself against what she had to say.

“At first it was just kissing. In the undersea, he just - he made me kiss him. Made me… made me pretend I was kissing you.”

Cardan closed his eyes, breathed once, as though this was bad enough. Jude felt the pain of what she was putting him through as acutely as the pain of what had happened to her.

“Then… he ordered me to come to him, afterward. I had to pretend to be under his control if I wanted to protect you. I had to do what he said. He… he touched me. Made me pretend I wanted it. Made me tell him to keep going. I’m sorry, Cardan, I didn’t have a choice—“

“Never,” Cardan said, and put his hands on either side of her face. “ _Never_ apologize for what he did to you.” Jude could see tears in his eyes, mirrors of her own.

“I’m so ashamed,” Jude whispered, “ashamed that I didn’t find another way.”

“There wasn’t another way, Jude, but to let me die. And you wouldn’t do that. Balekin,” and he choked on the name, “knew that you couldn’t agree to what he was doing to you. He knew that, and he didn’t care. He was evil, Jude, as long as it has taken me to realize it. One of the most evil faeries I have ever known.”

Cardan pulled Jude into his arms and, as she continued to cry, rocked her back and forth slowly.

“Jude, he will never hurt you again. He will never hurt either of us again. And I am so sorry, Jude, so sorry that I punished you for killing him and I didn’t even know, I never would’ve done it if I’d known, you have to know that. I never-“

“I know. It’s not your fault,” Jude said softly, stroking his arm where it held her. “None of it is your fault.”

“None of it is your fault either.”

Jude tilted her head up to kiss him.

“It doesn’t bother you?” Cardan asked. “What we do? It doesn’t make you think of him?”

“No,” said Jude. “Never. What we do… I think it’s helping me heal. There is power in giving up my control. Of knowing I can choose to take it back, and knowing that you’ll still respect me if I do. It’s not the same. Not ever. Giving up my control to you is healing.”

Jude wondered, for a moment, if that was what a real relationship with Cardan would be. Healing.

“My beloved girl,” Cardan murmured. “Thank you for telling me. I’m so proud of you.”

Jude closed her eyes into the way she felt, into the softness, into the warmth of his embrace and of his words.

Maybe this was healing, regardless. Maybe they could heal together.

**Author's Note:**

> My tumblr is [here](https://myqueenjudeduarte.tumblr.com), feel free to send me headcanons or prompts or anything! Also if you liked this/have specific BDSM things you want to see happen in future chapters, even if they're super specific, PLEASE comment and let me know! I'm super nervous about posting this so any feedback would be greatly appreciated <3


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